“Look here,” he said, with an abruptness that was only saved from being brusque by a softer intonation and a reassuring smile, “I met Miguel helping an accident into your buggy. Your orders, eh?” “Oh, yes,” said Josephine, quietly. “A man I saw on the road.” “Well, it's a bad case, and wants prompt attention. And as your house is the nearest I came with him here.” “Certainly,” she said gravely. “Take him to the second room beyond--Steve's room--it's ready,” she explained to two dusky shadows in the hall behind the doctor. “And look here,” said the doctor, partly closing the door behind him and regarding her with critical eyes, “you always said you'd like to see some of my queer cases. Well, this is one--a serious one, too; in fact, it's just touch and go with him. There's a piece of the bone pressing on the brain no bigger than that, but as much as if all Burnt Ridge was atop of him! I'm going to lift it. I want somebody here to stand by, some one who can lend a hand with a sponge, eh?--some one who isn't going to faint or scream, or even shake a hair's-breadth, eh?” The color rose quickly to the girl's cheek, and her eyes kindled. “I'll come,” she said thoughtfully. “Who is he?” The doctor stared slightly at the unessential query. “Don't know,--one of the river miners, I reckon. It's an urgent case. I'll go and get everything ready. You'd better,” he added, with an ominous glance at her gray frock, “put something over your dress.” The suggestion made her grave, but did not alter her color. A moment later she entered the room. It was the one that had always been set apart for her brother: the very bed on which the unconscious man lay had been arranged that morning with her own hands. Something of this passed through her mind as she saw that the doctor had wheeled it beneath the strong light in the centre of the room, stripped its outer coverings with professional thoughtfulness, and rearranged the mattresses. But it did not seem like the same room. There was a pungent odor in the air from some freshly-opened phial; an almost feminine neatness and luxury in an open morocco case like a jewel box on the table, shining with spotless steel. At the head of the bed one of her own servants, the powerful mill foreman, was assisting with the mingled curiosity and blase experience of one accustomed to smashed and lacerated digits. At first she did not look at the central unconscious figure on the bed, whose sufferings seemed to her to have been vicariously transferred to the concerned, eager, and drawn faces that looked down upon its immunity. Then she femininely recoiled before the bared white neck and shoulders displayed above the quilt, until, forcing herself to look upon the face half-concealed by bandages and the head from which the dark tangles of hair had been ruthlessly sheared, she began to share the doctor's unconcern in his personality. What mattered who or what HE was? It was--a case!