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At the Time Appointed

Page 17

As the day advanced Darrell grew gradually but steadily worse. After the

excitement of the night had passed a reaction set in; he felt utterly

exhausted and miserable, the pain returned with redoubled violence, and

the fever increased perceptibly from hour to hour.

He was keenly observant of those about him, and he could not but note

how soon the tragedy of the preceding night seemed forgotten. Some

bemoaned the loss of money or valuables; a few, more fortunate, related

how they had outwitted the robbers and escaped with trivial loss, but

only an occasional careless word of pity was heard for the young

stranger who had met so sad a fate. So quickly and completely does one

human atom sink out of sight! It is like the dropping of a pebble in the

sea: a momentary ripple, that is all!

About noon Parkinson, who had sought to while away the tedium of the

journey by an interview with Darrell, became somewhat alarmed at the

latter's condition and went in search of a physician. He returned with

the one who had been summoned to Whitcomb's aid. He was an eastern

practitioner, and, unfortunately for Darrell, was not so familiar with

the peculiar symptoms in his case as a western physician would have

been.

"He has a high fever," he remarked to Parkinson a little later, as he

seated himself beside Darrell to watch the effect of the remedies

administered, "but I do not apprehend any danger. I have given him

something to abate the fever and induce sleep. If necessary, I will

write out a prescription which he can have filled on his arrival at

Ophir, but I think in a few days he will be all right."

They were now approaching the continental divide, the scenery moment by

moment growing in sublimity and grandeur. Darrell soon sank into a

sleep, light and broken at first, but which grew deeper and heavier. For

more than an hour he slept, unconscious that the rugged scenes through

which he was then passing were to become part of his future life; that

each cliff and crag and mountain-peak was to be to him an open book,

whose secrets would leave their indelible impress upon his heart and

brain, revealing to him the breadth and length, the depth and height of

life, moulding his soul anew into nobler, more symmetrical proportions.

At last the rocks suddenly parted, like sentinels making way for the

approaching train, disclosing a broad, sunlit plateau, from which rose,

in gracefully rounded contours, a pine-covered mountain, about whose

base nestled the little city of Ophir, while in the background stretched

the majestic range of the great divide.

A crowd could be seen congregated about the depot, for tidings of the

night's tragedy had preceded the train by several hours, and Whitcomb

from his early boyhood had been a universal favorite in Ophir, while his

uncle was one of its wealthiest, most influential citizens.

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