Nora pulled up the trousers from both limbs and discovered that the left one was bloody from half way below the knee down, and it was Nora’s hands that washed the wound clean and prepared it for the dressing.
Elfreda Briggs, by this time, had returned with her first-aid kit, and was critically examining the scalp wound, Grace Harlowe standing over her with face full of interest and sympathy.
“This must be sewed up as soon as we have treated it,” announced Miss Briggs, nodding up at her companion. “Hippy, I shall have to take several stitches in your scalp, and I am going to hurt you. You won’t mind, will you, after all the fun you have been having tonight?”
“Get it over with,” muttered Hippy.
“Grace, you might dress the leg while I am doing this embroidery work for Hippy. Did the bullet go all the way through the leg?”
“Ye—es,” replied Nora. “I—I think so.”
“It did, through the fleshy part. It is not a bad wound,” volunteered Grace.
Miss Briggs began her work at once, and performed it quickly and skillfully. Hippy, despite himself, flinched under each needle thrust. A group of wondering, open-mouthed cowpunchers watched the Overland girl perform her operation, and by the time she had finished stitching the scalp together, Grace had completed her task on the leg wound.
“Oh! He’s dead!” cried Nora, after a quick look into Hippy’s now ghastly pale face.
“Don’t get excited! He has fainted, that’s all,” comforted Miss Briggs, who thereupon proceeded to revive her patient. The pain had been a little more than Hippy, in his weakened condition, could bear, and under it he had swooned.