I wheeled. "Diccon!" I cried. "What is the matter?"
Before I could reach him he had sunk to his knees. When I put my
hand upon his arm and again demanded what ailed him, he tried to
laugh, then tried to swear, and ended with another groan. "The ball
did graze my arm," he said, "but it went on into my side. I'll just lie
here and die, and wish you well at Jamestown. When the red imps
come against you there, and you open fire on them, name a bullet
for me."
CHAPTER XXXV IN WHICH I COME TO THE GOVERNOR'S HOUSE
I LAID him down upon the earth, and, cutting away his doublet
and the shirt beneath, saw the wound, and knew that there was a
journey indeed that he would shortly make. "The world is turning
round," he muttered, "and the stars are falling thicker than the
hailstones yesterday. Go on, and I will stay behind, - I and the
wolves."
I took him in my arms and carried him back to the bank of the
stream, for I knew that he would want water until he died. My
head was bare, but he had worn his cap from the gaol at
Jamestown that night. I filled it with water and gave him to drink;
then washed the wound and did what I could to stanch the
bleeding. He turned from side to side, and presently his mind
began to wander, and he talked of the tobacco in the fields at
Weyanoke. Soon he was raving of old things, old camp fires and
night-time marches and wild skirmishes, perils by land and by sea;
then of dice and wine and women.
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