“You’re taking chances,” persisted the younger man. “Go—just—leave me—water, and—a gun.” He sank back.
“You got to keep more quiet,” said the doctor. “Here.” He lifted a cup to the dry lips.
When he left the bedside the man with the scar followed and leaned close. “Bill’s going to die,” he said in a low voice. “Look at his nails.”
Instead, the doctor looked at the speaker. There was a sinister light in those little, alert eyes; a cruel twist to the thin mouth. And the whole expression of the scarred face bespoke a sudden determination—a fiendish determination. Bill was past saving. Soon the cabin would be left behind. And the doctor—why let him go back to the town?
“He’s going to die,” repeated the man with the scar. “And you know it.”
“My friend,” answered the doctor, “I’ll tell you the truth. He ain’t got more’n one chance in a hunderd—and that’s a pretty slim one. If he ain’t better to-morrow I’ve got to operate.” He sat down.
The man with the scar sat down in front of him. The table was between them. He leaned his arms on it. “Don’t take me for a fool,” he advised.
The doctor folded his arms. “Now, look a-here,” he retorted, smiling; “don’t take me for a fool. I know what’s the matter with you.”
At that the man with the scar rose so suddenly that his bench tipped backward.
“Yas,” the doctor went on. “I know why you brung me here blindfolded and what you’re hidin’.”