"Don't make a fellow mad with misery," they heard him plead. "You know where to get it. You know it's worse than hell to have to choke off short."
"Of course I do," was the brutal answer. "If I'd never knew it before, I'd learned it that night on the train when you could have sent me help and wouldn't."
"My God, Paine! you asked me to steal from the captain's flask. I simply ask for what's my own——"
But the voice was suddenly hushed, for, springing to his feet, Mr. Davies hurried to the door. "Who is this—who have you here?" he asked. "You—you? Brannan!"
And then, as a slender, graceful, womanly shape came noiselessly in and appeared by the lieutenant's side, quivering, shaking in an agony of shame and misery and nervousness, the lonely patient threw himself over towards the wall, and burying his distorted face in his arms, burst into a passion of tears, the attendant meantime slinking out into the hall.
"Come back here, my man," ordered Davies, in low, stern voice, while Miss Loomis, without one instant of hesitation, threw off her cloak, drew a chair to the bedside, and laid her soft white hand upon the tumbled head of the wretched boy. Unwillingly, sullenly, the man obeyed.
"You are Paine, of 'A' troop, are you not?"
"Yes, sir. And the captain's orders and the doctor's were that he shouldn't have a drop."
"Never mind that. When did he get here? How did he come?"
