He looked at her sharply.  “Shucks!  Sal’ll pull through,” he said with mingled defiance and alarm.  “You ain’t saw her afore in one of them spells.  Besides, hit meks a difference when a gal’s paw and grandpaw and great-grandpaw was feud-followers.  A feud-follower teks more killin’ then ordinary folks.  Her maw was subjec’ to cramp colic afore her.”

“But this isn’t cramp colic,” Miss Fletcher urged, “it’s her appendix, and it wasn’t taken in time.”

“Well, ain’t they goin’ to draw it?” he asked irritably.  “Ain’t that whut we’re here fer?”

“Yes; but you don’t understand.  The doctor may decide not, to operate.”

The old man’s face wore a puzzled look, then his lips hardened: 

“Mebbe hit’s the money thet’s a-woriyin’ him.  You go toll him that Jeb Hawkins pays ez he goes!  I got pension money sewed in my coat frum the hem clean up to the collar.  I hain’t askin’ none of you to cure my gal fer nothin’!”

Miss Fletcher laid her hand on his arm.  It was a shapely hand as well as a kindly one.

“It isn’t a question of money,” she said quietly, “it’s a question of life or death.  There is only a slight chance that your daughter will live through the day.”

Someone tapped at the door and Miss Fletcher, after a whispered consultation, turned again to the old man: 

“They have decided to take the chance,” she said hurriedly.  “They are carrying her up now.  You stay here, and I will let you know as soon as it is over.”

“Whar they fetching her to?” he demanded savagely.

“To the operating-room.”

“You take me thar!”

“But you can’t go, Mr. Hawkins.  No one but the surgeons and nurses can be with her.  Besides, the nurse who was just here said she had regained consciousness, and it might excite her to see you.”

She might as well have tried to stop a mountain torrent.  He brushed past her and was making his way to the elevator before she had ceased speaking.  At the open door of the operating-room on the fourth floor he paused.  On a long white table lay the patient, a white-clad doctor on either side of her, and a nurse in the background sorting a handful of gleaming instruments.  With two strides the old man reached the girl’s side.

“Sal!” he said fiercely, bending over her, “air ye wuss?”

Her dazed eyes cleared slightly.

“I dunno, Pop,” she murmured feebly.

“Ye ain’t fixin’ to die, air ye?” he persisted.

“I dunno, Pop.”

“Don’t you let ’em skeer you,” he commanded sternly.  “You keep on a-fightin’.  Don’t you dare give up.  Sal, do you hear me?”

The girl’s wavering consciousness steadied, and for a moment the challenge that the old man flung at death was valiantly answered in her pain-racked eyes.