Mrs. Baker met her husband at the door.
"How is he?" was the Captain's first question. "Better, hey?"
"No," was the nervous answer. "No, I don't think he is. His throat's terrible sore and the fever's just as bad."
Again Captain Hiram's conscience smote him.
"Dear! dear!" he exclaimed. "And I've been loafin' around the depot with Sol Berry and the rest of 'em instead of stayin' home with you, Sophrony. I KNEW I was doin' wrong, but I didn't realize--"
"Course you didn't, Hiram. I'm glad you got a few minutes' rest, after bein' up with him half the night. I do wish the doctor was home, though. When will he be back?"
"Not until late to-morrer, if then. Did you keep on givin' the medicine?"
"Yes, but it don't seem to do much good. You go and set with him now, Hiram. I must be seein' about supper."
So into the sick room went Captain Hiram to sit beside the crib and sing "Sailor boy, sailor boy, 'neath the wild billow," as a lugubrious lullaby.
Little Hiram Joash tossed and tumbled. He was in a fitful slumber when Mrs. Baker called her husband to supper. The meal was anything but a cheerful one. They talked but little. Over the home, ordinarily so cheerful, had settled a gloom that weighed upon them.
"My! my!" sighed Captain Hiram, "how lonesome it seems without him chatterin' and racketin' sound. Seems darker'n usual, as if there was a shadow on the place."
"Hush, Hiram! don't talk that way. A shadow! Oh, WHAT made you say that? Sounds like a warnin', almost."
"Warnin'?"
"Yes, a forewarnin', you know. 'The valley of the shadow--'"
"HUSH!" Captain Baker's face paled under its sunburn. "Don't say such things, Sophrony. If that happened, the Lord help you and me.
But it won't--it won't. We're nervous, that's all. We're always so careful of Dusenberry, as if he was made out of thin china, that we get fidgety when there's no need of it. We mustn't be foolish."
After supper Mrs. Baker tiptoed into the bedroom. She emerged with a very white face.
"Hiram," she whispered, "he acts dreadful queer. Come in and see him."
The "first mate" was tossing back and forth in the crib, making odd little choky noises in his swollen throat. When his father entered he opened his eyes, stared unmeaningly, and said: "'Tand by to det der ship under way."
"Good Lord! he's out of his head," gasped the Captain. Sophronia and he stepped back into the sitting room and looked at each other, the same thought expressed in the face of each. Neither spoke for a moment, then Captain Hiram said:
"Now don't you worry, Sophrony. The Doctor ain't home, but I'm goin' out to--to telegraph him, or somethin'. Keep a stiff upper lip. It'll be all right. God couldn't go back on you and me that way. He just couldn't. I'll be back in a little while."
"But, oh, Hiram! if he should--if he SHOULD be taken away, what WOULD we do?"
She began to cry. Her husband laid a trembling hand on her shoulder.
"But he won't," he declared stoutly. "I tell you God wouldn't do such a thing. Good-by, old lady. I'll hurry fast as I can."
As he took up his cap and turned to the door he heard the voice of the weary little first mate chokily calling his crew to quarters.
"All hands on deck!"
The telegraph office was in Beriah Higgins's store. Thither ran the Captain. Pat Sharkey, Mr. Higgins's Irish helper, who acted as telegraph operator during Gertie Higgins's absence, gave Captain Hiram little satisfaction.
"How can I get Dr. Parker?" asked Pat. "He's off on a cruise and land knows where I can reach him to-night. I'll do what I can, Cap, but it's ten chances out of nine against a wire gettin' to him."
Captain Hiram left the store, dodging questioners who were anxious to know what his trouble might be, and dazedly crossed Main Street, to the railway station. He thought of asking advice of his friend, the depot master.
The evening train from Boston pulled out as he passed through the waiting room. One or two passengers were standing on the platform.
One of these was a short, square-shouldered man with gray side whiskers and eyeglasses. The initials on his suit case were J. S.
M., Boston, and they stood for John Spencer Morgan. If the bearer of the suit case had followed the fashion of the native princes of India and had emblazoned his titles upon his baggage, the commonplace name just quoted might have been followed by "M.D., LL.D., at Harvard and Oxford; vice president American Medical Society; corresponding secretary Associated Society of Surgeons; lecturer at Harvard Medical College; author of 'Diseases of the Throat and Lungs,' etc., etc."
But Dr. Morgan was not given to advertising either his titles or himself, and he was hurrying across the platform to Redny Blount's depot wagon when Captain Hiram touched him on the arm.
"Why, hello, Captain Baker," exclaimed the Doctor, "how do you do?"
"Dr. Morgan," said the Captain, "I--I hope you'll excuse my presumin' on you this way, but I want to ask a favor of you, a great favor. I want to ask if you'll come down to the house and see the boy; he's on the sick list."
"What, Dusenberry?"
"Yes, sir. He's pretty bad, I'm 'fraid, and the old lady's considerable upsot about him. If you just come down and kind of take an observation, so's we could sort of get our bearin's, as you might say, 'twould be a mighty help to all hands."
"But where's your town physician? Hasn't he been called?"
The Captain explained. He had inquired, and he had telegraphed, but could get no word of Dr. Parker's whereabouts.
The great Boston specialist listened to Captain Hiram's story in an absent-minded way. Holidays were few and far between with him, and when he accepted the long-standing invitation of Mr. Ogden Williams to run down for the week end he determined to forget the science of medicine and all that pertained to it for the four days of his outing. But an exacting patient had detained him long enough to prevent his taking the train that morning, and now, on the moment of his belated arrival, he was asked to pay a professional call.
