d.

"Do not try to lift your head," she said. "I will do that for you."

She did it with skill and laid him back again with a gay laugh.

"There," she said. "There is one thing, and one only, that they teach in
covents."

As she spoke she turned to write on a sheet of paper the exact hour and
minute at which he recovered consciousness. For her knowledge was fresh
enough in her mind to be half mechanical in its result.

"Will that drug make me sleep?" asked Marcos, alertly.

"Yes."

"How soon?"

"That depends upon how stale the little apothecary's stock-in-trade may
be," answered Juanita. "Probably a quarter of an hour. He is a queer
little man and unwashed. But he set your collar-bone like an angel. You
have to do nothing but keep quiet. I fancy you will have to be content
with a quiet seat in the background for some weeks, amigo mio."

She busied herself as she spoke, with some duties of a sick-nurse which
had been postponed during his unconsciousness.

"It is nearly six o'clock," she said, without appearing to look in his
direction. "So you need not try to peep round the corner at the clock.
Please do not manage things, Marcos. It is I who am manager of this
affair. You and Uncle Ramon think that I am a child. I am not. I have
grown up--in a night, like a mushroom, and Uncle Ramon has been sent to
bed."

She came and sat down at the bedside again.

"And Cousin Peligros has not been disturbed. She has not left her room.
She will tell us to-morrow morning that she scarcely slept at all. A real
lady never sleeps well, you know. She must have heard us but she did not
come out of her room. For which we may thank the Saints. There are some
people one would rather not have in an emergency. In fact, when you come
to think of it--how many are there in the world whose presence would be
of the slightest use in a crisis--one or two at the most."

She held up her finger to emphasise the smallness of this number, and
withdrew it again, hastily. But she was not quick enough, for Marcos had
seen the ring and his eyes suddenly brightened. She turned away towards
the window, holding her lip between her teeth, as if she had committed an
indiscretion. She had been talking against time slowly and continuously
to prevent his talking or thinking, to give the apothecary's soothing
drug time to take effect. For the little man of medicine had spoken very
clearly of concussion and its after-effects. He had posted off to
Pampelun