So, for the first time in his healthy life, Jim found himself an invalid; sent to bed and ministered to by a frail, sweet-faced woman in a white uniform, whose presence on that far away ranch was a puzzle to him. Until, seeing his evident curiosity, she satisfied it by the explanation:
“Oh! I’m merely another of Mr. Ford’s beneficiaries. My brother is an engineer on one of his railroads, and he heard that I was threatened with consumption. So he had me sent to Denver for a time, till San Leon was ready. Then I came here. I’m on hand to attend any sick folks who may need me, though you’re the first patient yet. I can tell you that you’re fortunate to number Daniel Ford among your friends. He’s the grandest man in the world.”
Jim lay quiet for a time, till his supper was brought in. But he could not taste that. The dressing of his wounded arm had been painful in extreme, though he had borne the pain without a groan, and for that been greatly admired by both the surgeon and the nurse. He was now feverish and discontented. The “happy summer” of which Dorothy had boasted was beginning anything but happily for him. He was angry against his own weakness and disappointed that he could not at once begin his work of studying the rocks of this region. To do so had been his chief reason for accepting Mr. Ford’s genial invitation, for his shyness shrank from meeting strangers and accepting favors from them. Dr. Sterling had talked him “out of his nonsense” for the time being, but he now wished himself back in his familiar room at Deerhurst lodge, with Hans and Griselda Roemer. They were humble folk and so was he. He had no business in this rich man’s “shack” that was, in reality, a palace; where pleasure was the rule and work the exception. Well—things might happen! He’d take care they should! He was among the mountains—for that part he was glad; only regretful of the debt to another which had brought him there.
The hum of voices in and about the big house ceased. Even the barking dogs were silent at last, and the music from the men’s quarters, stopped. There was where he, Jim belonged, by right. Out in some of the many buildings at the rear; so many, in fact, that they were like a village. He guessed he’d go there. Yes. In the morning, maybe the Boss would give him a job, and he could work to pay his keep. His thoughts grew wilder and more disordered, his head ached.
The nurse was sitting silent in an adjoining room. Actual watching was unnecessary and she understood her patient’s mood, that her presence in his chamber worried him. It was his time—now or never. He crept from his bed and stepped out of the low window upon the wide porch.
Even in his delirious confusion it struck him that he had never seen such wonderful moonlight, nor such a big, inviting world. The vagary of thought altered. He would not seek the workmen’s quarters, after all. The mountains were better. They called him. They did not seem far away. He would not feel so hot and then so shivery if he could lie down on their cool tops, with only the sky above him. Aye, they called him; and blindly answering to their silent summons the sick boy went. The things he prophesied had surely begun to “happen.”