“Say, Doc, kin I see y’u a minute?”
Looking up I saw standing in the doorway one of the boys, who was familiarly known as Toppy, his States’ name being Ike Dexter. Toppy motioned for me to come out on the porch, and impressed by his gravity of manner and earnestness of gesticulation, I hastened to comply.
“What is it, Toppy?” I asked.
“Well,” he said, “thar’s one uv my friends whut’s bin an’ got hisself hurt, an’ I want y’u ter come an’ fix him up. He’s a very parti’cler friend, an’ I’d like ter hev yer do yer best on him. Ye needn’t say nuthin’ ter the boys about it, jes’ now, Doc.”
“Very well, Toppy, I’ll go with you, but what kind of an accident has befallen your friend?” I asked.
“Oh, I dunno ez ye could jes’ call it a accident, Doc. It’s jest a little shootin’ scrape, that’s all, an’ I reckon ye’d better take some ’stracters erlong.”
In accordance with the honest miner’s suggestion I did take some bullet extractors with me.
“Ye see, Doc,” said Toppy, by way of preparatory explanation of the case I was about to see, “this yere friend of mine hez bin down in ’Frisco fer a spell, an’ might hev staid thar a good while longer, only some feller picked a row with him. Thar wuz a duel, an’ duels ain’t so pop’lar down ’Frisco way ez they useter wuz, ’specially when somebody gits hurt. A real bad accident happened ter th’ uther feller, an’ he passed in his checks. Jim—that’s my friend—got a ball in his thigh, whut stuck thar, and ez he didn’t hev much time to hunt fer a doctor, he jest come up hyar, whar its kinder quiet like, an’ we thort we’d hev y’u sorter look arter the thing. Ye see, Jim won’t keer to git ’round much fer a few weeks—not ’till that little accident gits blowed over”—and Toppy’s eyes gleamed humorously.
My friend led me down to the river bank, and pushing aside a clump of willows revealed a small, rudely constructed row-boat.
“Ah!” I said, as I took my seat in the somewhat insecure-looking and cranky little craft, “It is evident that you have taken your friend to your own cabin.”