“He can go for all I care,” said Austen, as he pushed open the door of the restaurant.

For a few days Mr. Meader hung between life and death.  But he came of a stock which had for generations thrust its roots into the crevices of granite, and was not easily killed by steam-engines.  Austen Vane called twice, and then made an arrangement with young Dr. Tredway (one of the numerous Ripton Tredways whose money had founded the hospital) that he was to see Mr. Meader as soon as he was able to sustain a conversation.  Dr. Tredway, by the way, was a bachelor, and had been Austen’s companion on many a boisterous expedition.

When Austen, in response to the doctor’s telephone message, stood over the iron bed in the spick-and-span men’s ward of St. Mary’s, a wave of that intense feeling he had experienced at the accident swept over him.  The farmer’s beard was overgrown, and the eyes looked up at him as from caverns of suffering below the bandage.  They were shrewd eyes, however, and proved that Mr. Meader had possession of the five senses—­nay, of the six.  Austen sat down beside the bed.

“Dr. Tredway tells me you are getting along finely,” he said.

“No thanks to the railrud,” answered Mr. Meader; “they done their best.”

“Did you hear any whistle or any bell?” Austen asked.

“Not a sound,” said Mr. Meader; “they even shut off their steam on that grade.”

Austen Vane, like most men who are really capable of a deep sympathy, was not an adept at expressing it verbally.  Moreover, he knew enough of his fellow-men to realize that a Puritan farmer would be suspicious of sympathy.  The man had been near to death himself, was compelled to spend part of the summer, his bread-earning season, in a hospital, and yet no appeal or word of complaint had crossed his lips.

“Mr. Meader,” said Austen, “I came over here to tell you that in my opinion you are entitled to heavy damages from the railroad, and to advise you not to accept a compromise.  They will send some one to you and offer you a sum far below that which you ought in justice to receive, You ought to fight this case.”

“How am I going to pay a lawyer, with a mortgage on my farm?” demanded Mr. Meader.

“I’m a lawyer,” said Austen, “and if you’ll take me, I’ll defend you without charge.”

“Ain’t you the son of Hilary Vane?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve heard of him a good many times,” said Mr. Meader, as if to ask what man had not.  “You’re railroad, ain’t ye?”

Mr. Meader gazed long and thoughtfully into the young man’s face, and the suspicion gradually faded from the farmer’s blue eyes.

“I like your looks,” he said at last.  “I guess you saved my life.  I’m —­I’m much obliged to you.”

When Mr. Tooting arrived later in the day, he found Mr. Meader willing to listen, but otherwise strangely non-committal.  With native shrewdness, the farmer asked him what office he came from, but did not confide in Mr. Tooting the fact that Mr. Vane’s son had volunteered to wring more money from Mr. Vane’s client than Mr. Tooting offered him.  Considerably bewildered, that gentleman left the hospital to report the affair to the Honourable Hilary, who, at intervals during the afternoon, found himself relapsing into speculation.