ven's sake, go on out o' here!"

Bibbs obeyed the gesture of a hand still bandaged. And the black silk
sling was still round Sheridan's neck, but no word of Gurney's and no
excruciating twinge of pain could keep Sheridan's hand in the sling. The
wounds, slight enough originally, had become infected the first time he
had dislodged the bandages, and healing was long delayed. Sheridan had
the habit of gesture; he could not "take time to remember," he said,
that he must be careful, and he had also a curious indignation with his
hurt; he refused to pay it the compliment of admitting its existence.

The Saturday following Edith's departure Gurney came to the Sheridan
Building to dress the wounds and to have a talk with Sheridan which
the doctor felt had become necessary. But he was a little before
the appointed time and was obliged to wait a few minutes in an
anteroom--there was a directors' meeting of some sort in Sheridan's
office. The door was slightly ajar, leaking cigar-smoke and oratory, the
latter all Sheridan's, and Gurney listened.

"No, sir; no, sir; no, sir!" he heard the big voice rumbling, and then,
breaking into thunder, "I tell you NO! Some o' you men make me sick!
You'd lose your confidence in Almighty God if a doodle-bug flipped his
hind leg at you! You say money's tight all over the country. Well, what
if it is? There's no reason for it to be tight, and it's not goin' to
keep OUR money tight! You're always runnin' to the woodshed to hide
your nickels in a crack because some fool newspaper says the market's a
little skeery! You listen to every street-corner croaker and then
come and set here and try to scare ME out of a big thing! We're IN on
this--understand? I tell you there never WAS better times. These are
good times and big times, and I won't stand for any other kind o' talk.
This country's on its feet as it never was before, and this city's on
its feet and goin' to stay there!" And Gurney heard a series of whacks
and thumps upon the desk. "'Bad times'!" Sheridan vociferated, with
accompanying thumps. "Rabbit talk! These times are glorious, I tell you!
We're in the promised land, and we're goin' to STAY there! That's all,
gentlemen. The loan goes!"

The directors came forth, flushed and murmurous, and Gurney hastened
in. His guess was correct: Sheridan had been thumping the desk with his
right hand. The physician scolded wearily, making good the fresh damage
as best he might; and then he said what he