"Well, no——" (Maudie telegraphed); "found it all I could do to bring myself back."
"Oh, well, that's the main thing," said the Colonel, battling with disappointment. Pricked by some quickened memory of the Boy's last home-coming: "I've had pretty queer dreams about you: been givin' Maudie the meanest kind of a time."
"Don't go gassin', Colonel," admonished the nurse.
"It's pretty tough, I can tell you," he said irritably, "to be as weak as a day-old baby, and to have to let other people——"
"Mustn't talk!" ordered Mac. The Colonel raised his head with sudden anger. It did not mend matters that Maudie was there to hold him down before a lot of men.
"You go to Halifax," said the Boy to Mac, blustering a trifle. "The Colonel may stand a little orderin' about from Maudie—don't blame him m'self. But Kentucky ain't going to be bossed by any of us."
The Colonel lay quite still again, and when he spoke it was quietly enough.
"Reckon I'm in the kind of a fix when a man's got to take orders."
"Foolishness! Don't let him jolly you, boys. The Colonel's always sayin' he ain't a soldier, but I reckon you better look out how you rile Kentucky!"
The sick man ignored the trifling. "The worst of it is bein' so useless."