The limp form in the saddle was untied and carried into the hotel. The clerk proffered the use of a room—the same room in which Dunbar had talked with Isaacs—and Hawkins was borne in there and laid down on the bed. A doctor was sent for.
“He’s got his gruel, that’s my opinion,” announced Wild Bill, surveying a wound in Hawkins’ breast.
“This,” said Jordan, in a voice that throbbed with deep feeling, “is my friend—the very man who came from Benner’s ranch and told me that trouble was brewing for Perry and Dunbar.”
“And he’s the man, parson,” added Wild Bill, “who helped me out of Benner’s adobe house. Red Steve and his White Caps were standing guard around the house to see that I didn’t make a getaway; and it was Hawkins, here, who came down the chimney, took the ropes off me, and helped me get out and find my horse. He said he had helped me because he was a friend of yours, and that you had brought him to see where he had been going wrong. When I left Hawkins, he was just starting off with Red Steve and the other White Caps. The scoundrels must have found out he helped me to get away—and paid him for it.”
Wild Bill, with sadness and regret in his face, looked down on the unconscious man.
“It was in a good cause, a good cause,” murmured the sky pilot. “Although a brand snatched from the burning, yet Ace Hawkins is nevertheless sure of his reward.”
The minister bent over and parted the tangled hair from Hawkins’ forehead; then, gently, he began chafing his temples.
Buffalo Bill had laid a hand on his heart.
“He’s alive yet,” said he.
At that moment the doctor came.