"Oh, I did that, I did it," she moaned. "I thought he would kill Mother—I——"
"Hush, Ruth," her father commanded. "He is harmless now. He is badly wounded—perhaps dying. We must do all that we can to save him. You know we are told by the Master to help our enemies and do good to them who despitefully use us."
They laid the unconscious young brave on Joe's bed, and Hannah Peniman brought a pan of hot water and began to bathe and dress the wound in his side. Her husband bending down beside her examined the wound.
"I'm afraid it is fatal," he said sadly, "but we will do the best we can for him." From his earliest youth it had been the desire of his heart to be a physician. Circumstances had made him a farmer, but all through his life he had retained his love for the art of surgery and medicine, and by continually practising upon the stock on his place and on members of his family he had attained a degree of skill not possessed by many regularly licensed doctors. He probed and cleaned the wound, took the pulse and heart-beat and set about reducing the temperature.
For several days following the young Indian lay on Joe's bed burning with fever, delirious and muttering, sick unto death. Ruth, who seemed stricken with horror at the suffering her hand had visited upon a fellow-creature, devoted herself to his nursing, in which Mrs. Peniman and Sara shared, and Joshua Peniman waited upon and watched over him as if he were a friend or a relative instead of a deadly foe.
One morning as Mr. and Mrs. Peniman were bending over him irrigating his wound he suddenly opened his eyes.
For a moment he lay staring at them as if he believed that his mind was still wandering. Then he stirred, grunted, and tried to sit up.
Joshua Peniman pushed him gently back upon the pillows.
"Heap sick," he said, accompanying the words with gestures that left no doubt of his meaning.
The Indian stared at him, then turned his head and looked intently into Hannah Peniman's face. She bent over him with soothing words, took his hand, and stroked her cool, soft hand across his forehead.