A dull red flush crimsoned Myra Longman's face. She watched Tess enviously as the girl tiptoed through the doorway and disappeared.
Ben Letts was stretched out on the rope cot, his massive head and thick neck swathed in bandages. Two huge hands, with patches of plaster here and there lay outside the red Indian blanket. The swollen upper lid was tightly pressed over his blind eye, the squint one slowly opening at Tessibel's entrance.
She looked down upon the bandaged face but for a moment; neither of them spoke.
"I see ye comes," Ben broke in at last.
"Yep, I's here ... What do ye want?"
A drop of salt water oozed from the weak eye; Ben moved his head as if in pain.
"Sop up the tear with the rag, will ye, Tess?" he grunted. "It air burnin' like hell fire."
Tessibel took the soiled cloth in her fingers, and not too lightly did as Ben bade her.
"Ye didn't tell Myry how I comed sick, did ye?" asked Ben, settling his head back upon the pillow.