Dr. Fox, when he appeared on the scene, was amazed to find the unconscious form of Gideon Prawle lying stretched out like a dead man upon the grass.
He passed him, however, to take a flying look into the surgery, and see how serious matters were in that quarter.
“You can’t do any good here,” said Jack. “Better look after Prawle. I’m sure something serious has happened to him. Charlie will be with me in a moment with another bucket, and the pair of us ought to be able to put this blaze out.”
Jack spoke encouragingly, for he saw that he already had the fire under control.
So Dr. Fox returned to the stranger from the West, and his experienced nostrils immediately detected the fresh odor of chloroform.
“Has the man committed suicide?” was his first thought. “No, he is not dead,” he said to himself, after he had put his ear down to the man’s chest and listened with professional accuracy for indications of heart-beats.
Dr. Fox being a small man, it was a physical impossibility for him to drag the big prospector up on his stoop out of the dampness.
The best he could do was to drag him over to the gravel walk, and this required much effort on his part.
Then he went into the cottage to get certain remedies to bring the man back to his senses.
With Charlie’s assistance Jack finally subdued the flames inside of another ten minutes, but a considerable amount of damage had been done to the surgery.