"There you are wrong. I know it to be the only thing possible for me to
do."
Curtis looked at her for a second as if he scarcely knew her, and then
abruptly abandoned the argument.
"I will not be responsible," he said, turning aside.
And she answered him unfalteringly:
"I will take the responsibility."
XVIII
Slowly Brett Mercer raised himself and tried to peer through his swollen
eyelids at the door.
"Don't bring any woman here!" he mumbled.
The effort to see was fruitless. He sank back, blind and tortured, upon
the pillow. He had been taken ill at one of his own outlying farms, and
here he had lain for days--a giant bereft of his strength, waiting for
death.
His only attendant was a farm-hand who had had the disease, but knew
nothing of its treatment, who was, moreover, afraid to go near him.
Curtis took in the whole situation at a glance as he bent over him.
"Why didn't you send for me?" he said.
"That you?" gasped Mercer. "Man, I'm in hell! Can't you give me
something to put me out of my misery?"
Curtis was already at work over him.
"No," he said briefly. "I'm going to pull you through. You're wanted.
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