There had been a difference between Archer and his surgeon. The shack was no place for a patient in such a plight. It was on low ground, hot and stuffy in spite of high ceilings. Bentley wished him borne on elastic litter to hospital. Archer said bear him to his quarters, Mrs. Archer _would_ have it, and it was so ordered and done. Bentley wished to find that bullet, the blunt, old-fashioned, soft lead plug, and find it he had, lying fortunately close under the skin, after traversing several inches of Willett's anatomy without piercing a vital organ. It was cut out with little time or trouble, and set aside, sealed for future reference. Fever, of course, set in, and where, asked Archer, could more devoted nurse or nurses be found, and, in the absence of the patient's own mother, what woman had better right?
It wasn't so much _that_, said poor Bentley, as that they might overdo it--wear themselves out, and the patient, too. Willett was babbling in feverish delirium when his litter was borne into the general's dark hallway, and the patient thence to the white cot prepared for him, where Mrs. Archer and Mrs. Stannard at first were installed as nurses. Bentley shook his head over the arrangement, and later he spoke of it to Harris who sat thoughtful, troubled and ill at ease.
Bentley had told him of the discovery of the revolver and the universal connection of 'Tonio with the attempted murder, and Harris bowed his head wearily upon his hands: "I will not believe it," was all he said.
A sergeant and six men had gone with despatches and orders to find the field column along the Black Mesa. A runner had been sent to McDowell with the news, and another to Camp Sandy, where was Colonel Pelham, the district commander, giving details of the attempted assassination of the young staff officer, and warning all to arrest 'Tonio on sight. The affair was the one topic of talk in every barrack room, mess, and gathering at the post, and the subject of incessant comment and speculation at the store. That 'Tonio was the culprit no man was heard to express the faintest doubt. There were some who went so far as to say that _any_ man, officer, soldier or civilian, who dared to strike an Indian of 'Tonio's lineage had nothing less to expect. The one question was, how had 'Tonio succeeded in luring his victim, unarmed, to the spot, and why had he left his vengeance unfinished? The one man along officers' row to express dissent from public opinion was Lieutenant Harris; the one man at the store to sit in unresponsive silence was Mr. Case--the bookkeeper.
