"What the mission wur he never said, and I concluded that though he was all there in other things his brain had somehow got mixed on that point, onless it wur that his mission was to look after the sick. Waal, we were a rough lot in '49, you bet. Lynch-law hadn't begun, and there wuz rows and fights of the wust kind. Our camp had been pretty quiet ontil someone set up a saloon and gambling shop, and some pretty tough characters came. That was just as I wur getting about agin, though not able to work regular. It wurn't long before two fellows became the terror of the camp, and they went on so bad that the boys began to talk among themselves that they must be put down; but no one cared about taking the lead. They had shot four fellows in the first week after they came.
"I hadn't seen Softy for ten days. He had been away nussing a woodman as had his leg broke by the fall of a tree. I was sitting outside my tent with a chap they called Red Sam. We had a bottle of brandy between us, when them two fellows came along, and one of them just stooped and took up the bottle and put it to his lips and drank half of it off, and then passed it to the other without saying by your leave or anything. Red Sam said, 'Well, I'm blowed!' when the fellow who had drunk whipped out his bowie—six-shooters had hardly come in then—and afore Red Sam could get fairly to his feet he struck him under the ribs. Waal, I jumped up and drew my bowie, for it wur my quarrel, you see. He made at me. I caught his wrist as the knife was coming down, and he caught mine; but I wur like a child in his arms. I thought it wur all over with me, when I heard a shout, and Softy sprang on the man like a wild cat and drove his knife right into him, and he went down like a log.
"The other shouted out an oath and drew. Softy faced him. It wur the strangest sight I ever seen. His hat had fallen off, and his hair, which wur just as white then as it is now, fell back from his face, and his eyes, that looked so soft and gentle, wur just blazing. It came across me then, as it have come across me many a time since, that he looked like a lion going to spring; and I think Buckskin, as the man called himself, who had often boasted as he didn't fear a living thing, was frighted. They stood facing each other for a moment, and then Softy sprang at him. He was so quick that instead of Buckskin's knife catching him, as he intended, just in front of the shoulder and going straight down to the heart, it caught him behind the shoulder, and laid open his back pretty near down to the waist.
"But there wur no mistake about Softy's stroke. It went fair between the ribs, and Buckskin fell back dead, with Softy on the top of him. Waal, after that it wur my turn to nuss the doctor, for no one called him Softy after that. He wur laid up for over a month, and I think that letting out of blood did him good and cleared his brain like. When he got well he wur just as you see him now, just as clear and as sensible a chap as you would see. Why, he has got as much sense as you would find in any man west of Missouri, and he's the truest mate and the kindest heart. I have never seen the doctor out of temper, for you can't call it being out of temper when he rises up and goes for a man; that is his mission. He has never got that out of his head, and never will ontil he dies.
"He can put up with a deal, the doctor can; but when a man gits just too bad for anything, then it seems to him as he has got a call to wipe him out, and he wipes him out, you bet. You don't want lynch-law where the doctor is: he is a judge and a posse all to himself, and for years he was the terror of hard characters down in California. They was just skeered of him, and if a downright bad man came to a camp and heard the doctor wur there, he would in general clear straight out agin. He has been shot and cut all over, has the doctor, and half a dozen times it seemed to me I should never bring him round agin.
"It ain't no use talking to him and asking him why he should take on hisself to be a jedge and jury. When it's all over he always says in his gentle way that he is sorry about it, and I do think he is, and he says he will attend to his own business in future; but the next time it is just the same thing again. There ain't no holding him. You might just as well try to stop a mountain lion when he smells blood. At such times he ain't hisself. If you had once seen him you would never forget it. There wur a British painting fellow who wur travelling about taking pictures for a book. He wur in camp once when the doctor's dander rose, and he went for a man; and the Britisher said arterwards to me as it were like the bersek rage. I never heard tell of the berseks; but from what the chap said I guessed they lived in the old time. Waal, if they wur like the doctor I tell you that I shouldn't like to get into a muss with them. No, sir."
"Do you know what the doctor's history is, Sim?"
"Yes, I do know," he said, "but I don't suppose anyone else does. Maybe he will tell you some day if he gets over this."
"Oh! I don't want to know if it is a secret, Sim."
"Waal, there ain't no secret in it, Lightning; but he don't talk about it, and in course I don't. It is a sort of thing that has happened to other men, and maybe after a bit they have got over it; but the doctor ain't. You see he ain't a common man: he has got the heart of a woman, and for a time it pretty nigh crazed him."