“Nothing serious?” questioned Mr. Miller.
“Not in the slightest,” asserted the doctor, with a belittling shake of his head, and withdrawing the probe from the last hole. “I’ll simply dress this place with antiseptic, and you can take him home in my carriage. Just have him keep quiet for a few days, and I think that he’ll soon be as fit as a fiddle.”
So Ned was carried home in Doctor Mathews’ carriage, his father driving. Tom was left to bring the guns, and answer queries along the way.
One would suppose that Mrs. Miller, by this time, would have been so used to having Ned return after having figured in some hair-breadth escape, that she would take no especial notice of such a little thing as thirteen shot in his left shoulder.
But when she witnessed him gingerly clamber down upon the horse-block, his arm in a sling, she acted as though this was his first, instead of maybe his hundredth, accident.
Yet the thirteen shot in his shoulder did not concern her so much as did the rest of the load, that had passed so near, just missing his neck and his lungs.
Bob followed Ned in from the gate, and sniffing the antiseptic, and wondering why his master did not respond, as usual, to his energetic greetings, remained upon the front porch, to consider the new smell, and ponder over what was up.
Ned’s wound did not trouble him much. He got his hurts easily, as a rule, and just as easily he was rid of them. Young blood is good blood for healing purposes, as well as for purposes in general.
Tom was constant in his attentions, as were Zu-zu and Mrs. Pearce. They sent or brought fruit and books and everything that might benefit or amuse.