"You call the foreman and tell him to get up steam on the big launch, Hallowell." Burford, very pale, took command of the situation. "Miss Hallowell, will you go and bring Sally Lou? I want her right away. She's all kinds of good in an emergency."
Marian fled, her own heart pounding in her throat. But Sally Lou, after the first scared questions, rose to the occasion, steady and serene.
"Light the stove and make our soapstones and sand-bags piping-hot, Mammy. Heat some bouillon and put it into the thermos bottle. Ned, you and the foreman must take him down to Grafton Landing on the launch. The Lucy Lee is due to reach Grafton late this afternoon. I'll catch the Lucy's captain on the long-distance telephone at the landing above Grafton, and tell him to wait at Grafton Landing till you get there with Mr. Carlisle. Then you can put him aboard the Lucy. She will make Saint Louis in half the time that you could make it with the launch. Besides, the Lucy will mean far easier travelling for Mr. Carlisle."
"I never thought of the Lucy! I'd meant to wait with him at the Landing and take the midnight train. But the steam-boat will be a far easier trip. Sally Lou, you certainly are a peach!" Young Burford looked at his wife with solemn admiration. "Go and telephone, quick. We'll have Carlisle ready to start in an hour."
In less than an hour the launch was made ready, with cot and pillows and curtains, as like an ambulance as a launch could well be. With clumsy anxious pains Roderick and Burford lifted their chief aboard. Marian hung behind, eager to help, yet too frightened and nervous to be of service. But Sally Lou, her yellow hair flying under her ruffly red bonnet, her baby laughing and crowing on her shoulder, popped her flushed face gayly under the awning to bid Mr. Carlisle good-by.
"If it wasn't for these babies I'd go straight along and take care of you myself, Mr. Carlisle," she cried. "But the hospital will take better care of you than I could, I reckon. And the week's vacation will do you no end of good. Besides it will set these two lazybones to work." She gave her husband a gentle shake. "Ned and Mr. Hallowell will have to depend on themselves, instead of leaving all the responsibility to you. It will be the making of them. You'll see!"
"Perhaps that is true." Carlisle's gray lips smiled. He was white with suffering, but he spoke with his unvarying kind formality. "I am leaving you gentlemen with a pretty heavy load. But—I am not apprehensive. I know that you boys will stand up to the contract, and that you will carry it on with success. Good-by, and good luck to you!"
The launch shot away down-stream. Sally Lou looked after it. Marian saw her sparkling eyes grow very grave.
"Mr. Carlisle is mighty brave, isn't he? But he will not come back to work in a week's time. No, nor in a month's time either if I know anything about it. But there's no use a-glooming, is there, Thomas Tucker! You two come up to my house and we'll have supper together and watch for Ned; for if he meets the Lucy at Grafton he can bring the launch back by ten to-night."
Sally Lou was a good prophet. It was barely nine when Ned's launch whistled at the landing. Ned climbed the steps, looking tired and excited.