Carolyn of the Corners Part 25

"Oh, do wake up! Please wake up!" she cried, digging away the snow as fast as possible.

A s.h.a.ggy head was revealed, with an old cap pulled down tightly over the ears. The man moved again and grunted something. He half turned over, and there was blood upon the snow, and a great frosted cake of it on the side of his face.

Carolyn May was dreadfully frightened. The man's head was cut and the blood was smeared over the front of his jacket. Now she could see a puddle of it, right where he had fallen on the ice-just as she had fallen herself. Only, he had struck his head on a rock and cut himself.

"You poor thing!" murmured Carolyn May. "Oh, you mustn't lie here! You must get up! You'll-you'll be frozen!"

"Easy, mate," muttered the man. "I ain't jest right in my top-hamper, I reckon. Hold hard, matey."

He tried to get up. He rose to his knees, but pitched forward again.

Carolyn May was not afraid of him now-only troubled.

"I'll take you to Miss Amanda," cried the little girl, pulling at his coat again. "She's a nurse, and she'll know just what to do for you.

Come, Prince and I will take you."

The dog stood by whining, acting as though he knew just what the trouble was and was anxious to help. The man struggled up into a kneeling posture.

"My top-hamper ain't jest right," he murmured again. "That was a crack!

Blood! I reckon I'm some hurt, miss."

"Well, I should say you were hurt!" Carolyn May responded briskly. "But I know Miss Mandy can fix you up. Let's go there-_now_! It's awfully cold standing here."

"Belike I can't get there," mumbled the man, still on his knees.

"Oh, you must! It's not far. You were coming towards The Corners, weren't you?"

"I was bound out o' town; yes, miss," the man replied.

"Miss Amanda's is the last house you pa.s.sed, then. It isn't far,"

repeated Carolyn May.

"I-I don't believe I kin make it, matey," groaned the man, evidently not quite clear in his mind whom he was addressing. He weaved to and fro as he knelt, his eyes half-closed, muttering and groaning to himself.

"Oh, you mustn't!" cried Carolyn May. "You mustn't give up. Crawl onto my sled. Prince and I can drag you to Miss Amanda's. Of course, we can."

"Believe you'd better leave me here, matey," muttered the man.

But Carolyn May would not hear to that. She bustled about, brought the sled closer to him, and made Prince stand around properly in his harness. Then she guided the half-blinded man to the sled, on which he managed to drop himself.

"But that dog can't never pull me, matey," he declared faintly.

"Oh, yes, he can," said Carolyn May cheerfully. "I can help, too. When you _have_ to do a thing, my Aunty Rose says, you just up and do it.

Now, Princey-_pull_!"

CHAPTER XV-THE OLD SAILOR

Aunty Rose's philosophy must have been correct. Prince pulled, and Carolyn May pulled, and together they got the sled, with the old sailor upon it, to the Parlow carpenter shop.

Mr. Parlow slid back the front door of his shop to stare in wonder at the group.

"For the great land of Jehoshaphat!" he croaked. "Car'lyn May! what you got there?"

"Oh, Mr. Parlow, do come and help us-quick!" gasped the little girl. "My friend has had a dreadful bad fall."

"Your friend?" repeated the carpenter. "I declare, it's that tramp that went by here just now!"

"Oh, no, sir! he isn't a tramp," declared Carolyn May firmly.

"Why ain't he, I sh'd like to know?" grumbled Mr. Parlow, coming gingerly forward.

"Why, if he were, Prince wouldn't have anything to do with him," was the little girl's a.s.sured reply. "This gentleman is hurt, Mr. Parlow."

Mr. Parlow made a clucking noise in his throat when he saw the blood.

"Guess you're right, Car'lyn May," he admitted. "Call Mandy. She must see this."

Miss Amanda's attention had already been attracted to the strange arrival. She ran out and helped her father raise the injured man from the sled. Together they led him into the cottage.

He was not at all a bad-looking man, although his clothing was rough and coa.r.s.e. His hands were big and square, with blunt fingers, and the fingers were half-crooked, or half-closed, all the time. Afterwards Carolyn May learned this was because the old man was a sailor and had pulled on ropes so many years.

The trained nurse and her father helped the man to the couch, after removing his pilot coat. Miss Amanda brought warm water and bathed the wound, removing the congealed blood from his face and neck.

"I think there should be a st.i.tch or two taken in this," she said, "but Dr. Nugent is a long way off. I can dress it all right and bind it up.

But if it was sewed, the wound would not leave so bad a scar."

"That's no matter-no matter at all, matey," the man hastened to say.

"I've no money for them doctors."

"Ha!" coughed Mr. Parlow. "It's not a matter of dollars-Well, Mandy, if you think you can fix him up all right--"

The nurse was ready with lint and bandages and a dark, pleasant-smelling balsam in a bottle. Carolyn May, who had untackled Prince on the porch, stood by, and watched Miss Amanda's skilful fingers in wonder.

The old sailor did not even groan, so the child had no idea that the drops of perspiration that gathered on his brow, and which Miss Amanda finally wiped away so tenderly, were called into being by acute suffering.

When the last bandage was adjusted and the injured man's eyes were closed, Mr. Parlow offered him a wine-gla.s.s of a home-made cordial. The sailor gulped it down, and the colour began to return to his cheeks.

"Where was you goin', anyway?" demanded the carpenter. "This ain't no good day to be travellin' in. I don't see what that child was a-thinkin'

on, to be out playin' in such weather."

"Lucky for me she was out," said the sailor, more vigorously.

"Ya-as, I reckon that's so," admitted Mr. Parlow. "But, where was you goin'?"

"Lookin' for a job, mate," said the sailor. "There's them in town that tells me I'd find work at Adams' camp."