XXII
THE DOC CONCOCTS A PLOT
"So you see I'm through with this place!" Fairchilds concluded as, late that night, he and the doctor sat alone in the sitting-room, discussing the afternoon's happenings.
"I was forced to believe," he went on, "when I saw Jake Getz's fearful anxiety and real distress while Tillie remained unconscious, that the fellow, after all, does have a heart of flesh under all his brutality. He had never seen a woman faint, and he thought at first that Tillie was dead. We almost had HIM on our hands unconscious!"
"Well, the faintin' saved Tillie a row with him till he got her home oncet a'ready," the doctor said, as he puffed away at his pipe, his hands in his vest arms, his feet on the table, and a newspaper under them to spare the chenille table-cover.
"Yes. Otherwise I don't know how I could have borne to see her taken home by that ruffian—to be punished for so heroically defending ME!"
"You bet! That took cheek, ain't?—fur that little girl to stand there and jaw Jake Getz—and make him quit lickin' you! By gum, that minds me of sceneries I've saw a'ready in the theayter! They most gener'ly faints away in a swoond that way, too. Well, Tillie she come round all right, ain't?—till a little while?"
"Yes. But she was very pale and weak, poor child!" Fairchilds answered, resting his head wearily upon his palm. "When she became conscious, Getz carried her out of the woods to his buggy that he had left near the school-house."
"How did Absalom take it, anyhow?"
"He's rather dazed, I think! He doesn't quite know how to make it all out. He is a man of one idea—one at a time and far apart. His idea at present is that he is going to marry Tillie."