The wounded man had recovered consciousness now, and was groaning, and clinching his fists, and rolling his head from side to side in agony.
"Are you a doctor?" asked Steele incredulously.
"My uncle is," Ross returned briefly, "and I’m going to be."
The answer, coupled with a view of the contents of the chest and Ross’s manipulation of those contents, brought relief to the men.
He had produced a hypodermic syringe, and with a tiny morphine tablet dissolved in the salt cellar he began operations which lasted the greater part of two hours, and employed every man present.
"Bring in that hen-coop," directed Ross; "we can use that for a double inclined plane to stretch the leg over."
Steele, who had so recently issued orders to a slow and clumsy boy, now quietly obeyed this embryo surgeon. Hillis was holding bandages, while Hank and Andy were doing something which filled their souls with wonder, namely, making long, narrow bags from grain sacks out of which wheat had been hastily dumped.
"By the great horn spoon, what’re these fer?" Andy demanded in an undertone, running the big needle deep into his thumb. "Jehoshaphat!"
Hank shook his head helplessly. He plumped a stick of wood into his rusty old stove, and refilled a kettle from a water pail which stood on a box. Steele dragged in the triangular chicken-coop, and laid it beside the wounded man, who was moaning mechanically and drowsily now.
Ross arose, and set a bottle of alcohol on the table. He looked critically at the coop. "The very thing," he muttered with eyes alight. "How fortunate that I fell over it coming in!" Then he paused in thought.