So like a child, that Mrs. Sheppard, very tender of her, yet treated her with as much deference as she might a mild kitten. That girl was just as anxious that Bill Sanders's broth should be properly salted, and Pen's pinafore white, as she was to know Banks's position. Pish! Yet Mrs. Sheppard told Pen pages of "Mother Goose" in the evenings, that the girl might have time to read to Doctor Blecker. She loved him as well as if he were her husband; and a good wife she would be to him! Paul, looking at the two, as they sat by his bedside, knew better than she; saw clearly in which woman lay the spring of steel, that he never could bend, if her sense of right touched it. He used to hold her freckled little hands, growing yellow and rough with the hard work, in his, wondering what God meant him to do. If they both could lie dead together in that great grave-pit behind the Virginia Heights, it would have been relief to him. If he should let her go blindfold into whatever hell lay beyond death, it would be more merciful to her than to give her to her husband yonder. For himself--No, he would think only of her, how she could be pure and happy. Yet bigamy? No theory, no creed could put that word out of his brain, when he looked into her eyes. Never were eyes so genial or so pure. The man Gurney, he learned from Sheppard and Nott, recovered but slowly; yet there was no time to lose; a trivial accident might reveal all to her. Whatever struggle was in Blecker's mind came to an end at last; he would go through with what he purposed; if there were crime in it, he took it to his own soul's reckoning, as he said before. It was a cool morning in early August, when the Doctor first crept out of bed; a nipping north-wind, with a breath of far-off frost in it, just enough to redden the protruding cheek of the round gum-trees on the mountain-ledges and make them burn and flame in among the swelling green of the forests. He dragged himself slowly to the wooden steps and waited in the sunshine. The day would be short, but the great work of his life should be done in it. "Sheppard!" he called, seeing the two square, black figures of the Colonel and his mother trotting across the sunny street. "Hillo! you'll report yourself ready for service soon, at this rate, Doctor." "In a week. That man Gurney. When can he be removed?" "What interest can you have in that dirty log, Blecker? I've noticed the man since you asked of him. He's only a Northern rogue weakened into a Southern bully." "I know. But his family are known to me. I have an order for his exchange: it came yesterday. He holds rank as captain in the other service, I believe?" "Yes,--but he's in no hurry to leave his bed, Nott tells me." "This order may quicken his recovery, eh?" "Perhaps." Sheppard laughed.