Dick Gordon lay on a bed in a sunny south room at the Corbett place.
He was swathed in bandages, and had something the appearance of a relic of the Fourth of July, as our comic weeklies depict Young America the day after that glorious occasion. But, except for one thing which he had on his mind, the Coloradoan was as imperturbably gay as ever.
He had really been a good deal less injured than his rescuer; for, though a falling rafter had struck him down as he turned to leave the hut, this very accident had given him the benefit of such air as there had been in the cabin. Here and there he had been slightly burned, but he had not been forced to inhale smoke.
Wound in leg and all, the doctor had considered him out of danger long before he felt sure of Don Manuel.
The young Spaniard lay several days with his life despaired of. The most unremitting nursing on the part of his cousin alone pulled him through.
She would not give up; would not let his life slip away. And, in the end, she had won her hard fight. Don Manuel, too, was on the road to recovery.
While her cousin had been at the worst, Valencia Valdés saw the wounded Coloradoan only for a minute of two each day; but, with Pesquiera's recovery, she began to divide her time more equitably.
"I've been wishing I was the bad case," Dick told her whimsically when she came in to see him. "I'll bet I have a relapse so the head nurse won't always be in the other sick room."
"Manuel is my cousin, and he has been very, very ill," she answered in her low, sweet voice, the color in her olive cheeks renewed at his words.
The eyes of the Anglo-Saxon grew grave.
"How is Don Manuel to-night?"
"Better. Thank Heaven."
"That's what the doctor told me."
Dick propped himself on an elbow and looked directly at her, that affectionate smile of his on his face.
"Miss Valdés, do you know, ever since I've been well enough, I've been hoping that if one of us had to cross the Great Divide it would be me?"
Her troubled eyes studied him.
"Why do you say that?"
"Because it would seem more right that way. I came here and made all this trouble in the valley. I insulted him. I had in mind another hurt to him that we won't discuss just now. Then, when it comes to a showdown, he just naturally waltzes into Hades and saves my life for me at the risk of his own. No, ma'am, I sure couldn't have stood it if he had died."