"Any bigger than you are running, doctor?" Michael smiled gravely.
"H'm! Well, it's my business, and I don't suppose it is yours. There are people who are paid for those things. Come get out of this room or I won't answer for the consequences."
"The consequences will have to answer for themselves, doctor. I'm going to stay here till somebody better comes to nurse him."
Michael's eyes did not flinch as he said this.
"Suppose you take the disease?"
Michael smiled, one of his brilliant smiles that you could almost hear it was so bright.
"Why, then I will," said Michael, "but I'll stay well long enough to take care of him until the nurse comes anyway."
"You might die!"
"Of course." In a tone with not a ruffle in the calm purpose.
"Well, it's my duty to tell you that you'd probably be throwing your life away, for there's only a chance that he won't die."
"Not throwing it away if I made him suffer a little less. And you said there was a chance. If I didn't stay he might miss that chance, mightn't he?"
"Probably."
"Can I do anything to help or ease him?"
"Yes."
"Then I stay. I should stay anyway until some one came. I couldn't leave him so."
"Very well, then. I'm proud to know a man like you. There's plenty to be done. Let's get to work."
The hour that followed was filled with instructions and labor. Michael had no time to think what would become of his work, or anything. He only knew that this was the present duty and he went forward in it step by step. Before the doctor left he vaccinated Michael, and gave him careful directions how to take all necessary precautions for his own safety; but he knew from the lofty look in the young man's face, that these were mere secondary considerations with him. If the need came for the sake of the patient, all precautions would be flung aside as not mattering one whit.
The doctor roused the servants and told them what had happened, and tried to persuade them to stay quietly in their places, and he would see that they ran no risks if they obeyed his directions. But to a man and a woman they were panic stricken; gathering their effects, they, like the Arabs of old, folded their tents and silently stole away in the night. Before morning dawned Michael and his patient were in sole possession of the house.