Awakening from this, he saw Jennie sitting beside him. In some way she seemed to have changed. When he spoke she gave a start and turned eagerly to him.
“Duane!” she cried.
“Hello. How're you, Jennie, and how am I?” he said, finding it a little difficult to talk.
“Oh, I'm all right,” she replied. “And you've come to—your wound's healed; but you've been sick. Fever, I guess. I did all I could.”
Duane saw now that the difference in her was a whiteness and tightness of skin, a hollowness of eye, a look of strain.
“Fever? How long have we been here?” he asked.
She took some pebbles from the crown of his sombrero and counted them.
“Nine. Nine days,” she answered.
“Nine days!” he exclaimed, incredulously. But another look at her assured him that she meant what she said. “I've been sick all the time? You nursed me?”
“Yes.”