"Well, you've had your lesson. And you've worried all of us. Miss Valdés has called up two or three times a day on the phone and sent a messenger over every evening to find out how you were."
Dick felt the blood flush his face. "She has?" Then, after a little: "That's very kind of Miss Valdés."
"Yes. Everybody has been kind. Mr. Pesquiera has called up every day to inquire about you. He has been very anxious for you to recover."
A faint sardonic smile touched the white lips. "A fellow never knows how many friends he has till he needs them. So Don Manuel is in a hurry to have me get on my feet. That's surely right kind of him."
He thought he could guess why that proud and passionate son of Spain fretted to see him ill. The humiliation to which he had been subjected was rankling in his heart and would oppress him till he could wipe it out in action.
"You've got other friends, too, that have worried a lot," said Mrs. Corbett, as she took up some knitting.
"More friends yet? Say, ain't I rich? I didn't know how blamed popular I was till now," returned the invalid, with derisive irony. "Who is it this time I've got to be grateful for?"
"Mr. Davis."
"Steve Davis—from Cripple Creek, Colorado, God's Country?"
"Yes."