It was little that could be seen of the sick man, except a white shrunken face and closed eyes, as he lay on his bed of heather, with every description of garment piled upon him. He lay quite still and quiet, breathing rather heavily; and when his mother poured some wine down his throat from the basket that Colonel George carried with him, he only stirred slightly and composed himself again as it were to sleep. Then Lady Eleanor came out to hold the horses and Colonel George went in. She heard him ask a few questions, and when he came out he could only shrug his shoulders in answer to her inquiring glance. "I can make nothing of it and get nothing out of her," he said, "but I have seen that look on a man's face before, and it is not a look that I like to see. She seems unwilling to tell anything of the reason for his illness, but there must be some story at the bottom of it all, if we could only get at it. Go in and try."
So Lady Eleanor went in, while Colonel George stood at the door holding the horses, and sat for a time looking at the sick man in silence, till at last she asked the woman if she thought the bandsmen had hurt him when they seized him.
"No, 'twasn't the bandsmen," said the woman absently, and without looking up; "'twas the sarjint as did it."
"What did the serjeant do to him?" asked Colonel George from the door. "It is a shameful thing if he hurt him, for Brimacott told me that he had begged him not to be hard on him."
But the woman gave no answer, seeming rather ashamed to have said so much; and after another silence Lady Eleanor asked another question or two which was answered very shortly, and said something about calling in a doctor.
"Doctor, no!" answered the woman fiercely. "They never do nought but bleed a man to death."
"Are you sure?" said Colonel George. "I know there were army-doctors who used to bleed men disgracefully. You remember," he added, turning for a moment to Lady Eleanor, "what Charlie Napier of the Fiftieth wrote from Hythe, that the doctors thought bleeding to death the best way of recovering sick soldiers. But I don't suppose, my good woman, that you have ever had to do with such."
"What! not I?" said the woman scornfully, but instantly restrained herself and stopped.
"I should give him a drop more wine from time to time, mistress," said Colonel George, as if taking no notice of what she had said; and hitching the reins of the horses round the poles of the hut he took a spoon, and poured a little between the sick man's lips himself. "The poor fellow's dreadfully weak," he went on. "Was he ever sick or hurt as a boy, mistress? Did you ever see him taken like this before? If you could tell us, we might know better how to treat him." And as he asked the question he looked straight into the woman's face, very keenly but very kindly, and she dropped her eyes with a half sigh. "You see," he went on, "my Lady's little son came home and told us of a coat that you had put on him, which sounded to me like a drummer's coat; though of course as I haven't seen it I may be quite wrong; but I was wondering if he had ever been a soldier, as I am myself, and been wounded at some time."
"No, he wasn't never a soldier," said the woman hastily.