ife, who lay
in a delirium.

Jim Shirley had one of those sympathetic natures that read the joys and
sorrows of their friends without words. One look at Asher told him what
had been.

"The doctor was away up Wolf Creek, but I left word with his colored man
for him to come at once, and he'll do it," Jim assured Asher as he stood
for a moment beside the bed. "I didn't wait because you need me."

Asher lifted his head and looked at Jim. As man to man they knew as never
before the strength of their lifetime friendship.

"I need you. She needs the doctor. The baby--"

"Doesn't need any of us," Jim said softly. "I'll do what I can."

It is no strange, unreal story of the wilderness day, this fluttering in
and out of a little life, where no rosewood grew for coffins nor florists
made broken columns of white lilies and immortelles.

But no mother's hands could have been more gentle than the gentle hands of
Jim Shirley as he prepared the little form for burial.

Meantime the wind was at its wildest, and the plains blizzard swirled in
blinding bitterness along the prairie. The hours of the night dragged by
slowly to the two men hoping for the doctor's coming, yet fearing that
hope was impossible in the face of such a night.

"Carey has the keenest sense of direction I ever knew in a human being,"
Jim assured Asher. "I know he will not fail us."

Yet the morning came and the doctor came not. The day differed from the
night only in the visible fierceness of the storm. The wind swept howling
in long angry shrieks from the northwest. The snow seemed one dizzy,
maddening whirlpool of white flakes hanging forever above the earth.

Inside the cabin Virginia's delirium was turning to a frenzy. And Asher
and Jim forgot that somewhere in the world that day there was warmth and
sunlight, health and happiness, flowers, and the song of birds, and babies
cooing on their mothers' knees. And the hours of the day dragged on to
evening.

* * * * *

Meanwhile, Dr. Carey had come into Wykerton belated by the rains.

"The wind is changing. There'll be a snowstorm before morning, Bo Peep,"
he said wearily as the young colored man assisted him into warm, dry
clothes. "It's glorious to sit by a fire on a night like this. I didn't
know how tired I was till now."

"Yes, suh, I'se glad you all is home for the night, suh. I sho' is. I got
mighty little use for this yuh country. I'se sorry now I eve