"I'll get up anyhow."
"You just try it! I'd shore admire to see yuh try it! You ain't goin' to play any fool tricks with that ankle if I have to get Jim an' a few o' the boys to hogtie yuh. Tell yuh what I will do. To-morrow, if you'll give me yore word not to leave the house till Mis' Burr or I say you can, I'll give yuh yore clothes an' you can sit in the kitchen."
"I suppose I'll have to," grumbled Loudon.
"You shore will if yuh want to get up," stated the uncompromising lady.
"All right. I give yuh my word. Lemme get up now. The ankle feels fine."
"To-morrow, to-morrow—not one second sooner."
CHAPTER XVII
MRS. BURR RELIEVES HER MIND
Loudon, sitting comfortably in a big chair, his lame ankle supported on an upturned cracker-box, gazed at the world without through the frame of the kitchen doorway. Leaving his bed had raised his spirits appreciably. He rolled and smoked cigarettes and practised the road-agent's spin in pleasant anticipation of the day when he would ride away on his occasions.