For all Dick could ascertain his friend never stirred an eyelash nor a finger for twenty-seven hours.  When he awoke he was pale, weak, but the old Thorne.

“Hello, Dick; I didn’t dream it then,” he said.  “There you are, and my darling with the proud, dark eyes—­she’s here?”

“Why, yes, you locoed cavalryman.”

“Say, what’s happened to you?  It can’t be those clothes and a little bronze on your face....Dick, you’re older—­you’ve changed.  You’re not so thickly built.  By Gad, if you don’t look fine!”

“Thanks.  I’m sorry I can’t return the compliment.  You’re about the seediest, hungriest-looking fellow I ever saw....Say, old man, you must have had a tough time.”

A dark and somber fire burned out the happiness in Thorne’s eyes.

“Dick, don’t make me—­don’t let me think of that fiend Rojas!....I’m here now.  I’ll be well in a day or two.  Then!...”

Mercedes came in, radiant and soft-voiced.  She fell upon her knees beside Thorne’s bed, and neither of them appeared to see Nell enter with a tray.  Then Gale and Nell made a good deal of unnecessary bustle in moving a small table close to the bed.  Mercedes had forgotten for the moment that her lover had been a starving man.  If Thorne remembered it he did not care.  They held hands and looked at each other without speaking.

“Nell, I thought I had it bad,” whispered Dick.  “But I’m not—­”

“Hush.  It’s beautiful,” replied Nell, softly; and she tried to coax Dick from the room.

Dick, however, thought he ought to remain at least long enough to tell Thorne that a man in his condition could not exist solely upon love.

Mercedes sprang up blushing with pretty, penitent manner and moving white hands eloquent of her condition.

“Oh, Mercedes—­don’t go!” cried Thorne, as she stepped to the door.

“Senor Dick will stay.  He is not mucha malo for you—­as I am.”

Then she smiled and went out.

“Good Lord!” exclaimed Thorne.  “How I love her.  Dick, isn’t she the most beautiful, the loveliest, the finest—­”

“George, I share your enthusiasm,” said Dick, dryly, “but Mercedes isn’t the only girl on earth.”

Manifestly this was a startling piece of information, and struck Thorne in more than one way.

“George,” went on Dick, “did you happen to observe the girl who saved your life—­who incidentally just fetched in your breakfast?”

“Nell Burton!  Why, of course.  She’s brave, a wonderful girl, and really nice-looking.”

“You long, lean, hungry beggar!  That was the young lady who might answer the raving eulogy you just got out of your system....I—­well, you haven’t cornered the love market!”

Thorne uttered some kind of a sound that his weakened condition would not allow to be a whoop.

“Dick!  Do you mean it?”

“I shore do, as Laddy says.”