“Merçi!” muttered the doctor, as he looked compassionately at the sick child on the bed; “those noisy wretches will, I fear, disturb the little boy, and it’s as hot here too, padre, as the place we all are going to.”
“It is warm, my son!” he replied, as his thick unctuous lips parted with a smile at his companion’s allusion to another and a hotter place; “but I think our good capitano would have a cot slung for my little priest in the saloon of the big building there. It is always cool on the crag, you know.”
“Ah! perhaps he will,” said the doctor, reflectively; “I’ll see about it.”
Stepping again to the bedside of the little sufferer, he laid a hand gently on his forehead, where the soft curls lay in confusion about his temples, and then quickly touching his pulse, he regarded him 78 attentively for a few moments, while at the same time a light glow of perspiration came faintly over the innocent face and spread itself down the neck.
“His fever is breaking! Grace à Dieu!” whispered the doctor to the padre; “his breath is regular and cool, and he is sleeping sweetly. Now, if you like, we will go to see the captain, and, if he consents, I will carry the child when he wakes to the dwelling.”
The doctor carefully closed the door of the room as he and his companion stepped out into the open court-yard, and moved toward the spacious sheds beyond.
CHAPTER XIII.
A MANLY FANDANGO.
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“While feet and tongues like lightning go With––What cheer, Luke? and how do, Joe? Dick Laniard chooses Meg so spruce, And buxom Nell takes Kit Caboose.” “Now around they go, and around and around, With hop, skip, and jump, and frolicsome bound, Such sailing and gliding, Such sinking and sliding, Such lofty curvetting And grand pirouetting, Mix’d with the tones of a dying man’s groans, Mix’d with the rattling of dead men’s bones.” |