"No," he assented; "but neither can one ever really be chums with his hero.Or, even if he can, he doesn't care to try the experiment."Alice glanced at her watch, rose, then lingered.
"I am not so sure of that," she replied thoughtfully."I want the pedestal of my hero to be a low one; and Cooee declares that she wishes no pedestal at all.If her hero is worthy of the name, he must bear inspection even from above.The worst flaw of all might lurk in the very crown of his head."Half an hour later, she came back again.
"Mr.Weldon, do you feel strong enough to see Kruger Bobs for exactly five minutes?" she asked.
The gray eyes lighted.
"For ten times five," he answered eagerly.
Kruger Bobs shuffled in upon the heels of an orderly.Under his bristly hair, his face was a study of mingled emotions which culminated in his mouth.A grin of pure happiness had drawn up the upper lip; at sight of his prostrate master, the lower one was rolling outward in a sudden wave of pure pity.Beside the cot, he halted and stood looking down at Weldon with eyes which, for the moment, transformed his lazy, jolly, simian face into a species of nobility.Lying back on his pillow, Weldon waited for him to speak, waited with an odd, restless beating of the heart for which he was wholly at a loss to account.
The pause between them lengthened.At last Kruger Bobs drew his mangy brown felt hat across his eyes.
"I's here, Boss," he said simply.
However, it was enough.
The next morning found Weldon sitting up.A clean-cut hole through the flesh of a man who has lived a clean-cut life is swift in healing.Now that his fever had left him, his superb vitality was asserting itself once more, and he rallied quickly.Meanwhile, it was good to be able to sit up and eat his breakfast like a civilized being.Weldon had all the detestation of the average healthy being for invalid ways.Moreover, he longed to be up and doing.With his growing strength, the orderly, noiseless routine of the hospital came upon his nerves.One of the nurses always walked on the points of her toes; and he was conscious of a wild longing to throw a pillow at her, as she went diddling to and fro past him, a dozen times a day.The doctor, a man of iron nerve and velvet hand, was a daily delight to him.And there was always Alice, frank, friendly and altogether enjoyable.During the past three days, their liking had grown apace.Absolutely feminine, yet with the healthy impersonality of a growing boy, Alice Mellen was a born comrade, and Weldon enjoyed her just as, in her place, he would have enjoyed Carew.
She came down the ward, that morning, and paused beside his chair.
"You look like your old self at last," she said, as she held out her hand in congratulation.
"I might echo your words," he answered, while he looked up into her eyes, shining with merriment and with something that yet seemed to him closely akin to annoyance."Granted the apron, you might be pouring tea at home.""Not tea; but malted milk, in these latter days," she said, laughing."But I am about to retire from your case.May I introduce your new nurse, Mr.Weldon?"His reluctant assent was changed to eager greeting.Light, swift steps came down the room; a tall figure stopped at his side in the full glare of a sunshiny window which all at once seemed focussing its light upon waving strands and heaped-up coils of vivid yellow hair.
"Cooee!" Then, too late, he bethought himself of his manners and tried to bite the word off short.
Linking her arm in that of her cousin, the girl stood looking down at him with merry, mocking blue eyes.
"Invalids are supposed to have privileges denied to well men," she answered demurely."It might perhaps be Cooee here, to-day; but it will have to be Miss Dent, to-morrow, when you are back in the field again.After all, it is hardly worth while to make the change, Trooper Weldon."
