“But how does it come you weren’t killed?”
“Mebbe my skull’s too thick fer a ordinary pistol-ball t’ make a hole in. But I remember jerkin’ my head away, an’ I reckon th’ ball hit me a kind o’ glance blow, jest enough t’ stun me. You kin see how it parted my hair fer me.”
He held down his head, and Allan saw, furrowed in the scalp, a raw and bleeding wound.
“If you happen t’ have a handkercher in yer pocket,” Jed added, “mebbe you’d better tie it up till I have time t’ git it sewed t’gether.”
Allan got out his handkerchief and tenderly bandaged the wound as well as he was able.
“I reckon I’ll be bald fer quite awhile,” remarked Jed, when that operation was finished. “You see, my hat was knocked off in th’ scuffle, an’ my hair was jest ketchin’ fire. I reckon I didn’t come to any too soon.”
“Well,” said Allan, “I’m glad you came to when you did, not only for your sake, but for my own. You saved my life, too, you know.”
“Oh, shucks!” Jed protested. “Not a bit of it. You’d ’a’ got out all right. But I’m wastin’ time. I’ve got t’ hike away on th’ trail o’ them robbers. Hello! Here comes help!”
The station was by this time almost wholly in flames, which shot high into the air and were reflected on the clouds. The light had been observed in the village and everybody turned out of bed, awakened by the shouts, and started for the scene of the fire. The volunteer fire company, which possessed an antiquated hand-pump engine, got it out and yanked it along over the muddy road, although, if they had stopped to think, they would have known that there was no available water within reach of the station. However, at such a time, very few people do stop to think. It was, perhaps, a just punishment for their thoughtlessness that the members of the fire company were forced to tug the heavy engine back to the village by themselves, after the fire was over,—the populace, which had been only too eager to pull at the ropes on the outward trip, utterly refusing to lay a hand to them on the way back.
At the end of fifteen minutes, the station was surrounded by a seething mass of people, who understood imperfectly what had happened and applied their imaginations to supplying the details. It was Jed Hopkins who, in spite of his blistered face and scorched head, took the leadership and selected twenty men to form a posse to pursue the robbers. And just as this ceremony was completed, the midnight train pulled in and nearly a score of armed men leaped off, headed by the sheriff of Athens County.