"I knew it!" he cried. "I felt it in the poor devil's pulse. Miss Bessy, you have no right to make any one's pulse gallop so, has she, Sir Richard? Squire, your very humble servant. You have all come just in the nick of time, for I want help here. All the people are out in the field, and this poor girl is hardly able to help herself."
"Oh, dear Miss Bessy, I'se so glad to see you, and with your own people too," cried the poor man. "You'se very good to come and see poor Ercles."
"Hush!" said the doctor, "not a word, if you would have me save your life."
"Oh, I knows I'se going to die any how, Mas'r Christy," said the man.
"You shall die if you talk, and I won't try to save you," answered the doctor.
"How hot his hand is!" said Bessy, who had gone up and taken the gigantic black hand in hers.
"Yes," said the doctor, oracularly; "he has had great irritation all night, and is now somewhat low. But I have made up my mind to two things, since I have been sitting here, in the hope that some sensible person would come to help me. The first is, that no vital organ has been touched, though, as so often happens in wounds, all sorts of mortal places lay in the way. The second is, that two balls were in the gun, fired so near that they did not spread at all, and that one of them is still in the wound."
"I feel it burning here, close to my back, mas'r," said Hercules,
"I dare say you do," answered the doctor; "nothing else could produce the symptoms which I perceive. Now, I must get that bail out; and I want some one to hold his right arm down while I operate; for yesterday he would move it. The poor fellow could not help it indeed--it was involuntary when he felt the pain."
"Can I do it?" asked Bessy, in a low timid tone.