return of her paleness.
"Hadn't you better lie down again?" said the doctor solicitously.
"I'm all right now," returned Mrs. MacGlowrie, struggling to her feet;
"Morvin will look after me till the shakiness goes. But it was mighty
touching and neighborly to come in, Doctor," she continued, succeeding
at last in bringing up a faint but adorable smile, which stirred Blair's
pulses. "If I were my own dog--you couldn't have treated me better!"
With no further excuse for staying longer, Blair was obliged to
depart--yet reluctantly, both as lover and physician. He was by no means
satisfied with her condition. He called to inquire the next day--but she
was engaged and sent word to say she was "better."
In the excitement attending the advent of the new preacher the slight
illness of the charming widow was forgotten. He had taken the
settlement by storm. His first sermon at Laurel Spring exceeded even
the extravagant reputation that had preceded him. Known as the "Inspired
Cowboy," a common unlettered frontiersman, he was said to have developed
wonderful powers of exhortatory eloquence among the Indians, and
scarcely less savage border communities where he had lived, half
outcast, half missionary. He had just come up from the Southern
agricultural districts, where he had been, despite his rude antecedents,
singularly effective with women and young people. The moody dyspeptics
and lazy rustics of Laurel Spring were stirred as with a new patent
medicine. Dr. Blair went to the first "revival" meeting. Without
undervaluing the man's influence, he was instinctively repelled by
his appearance and methods. The young physician's trained powers of
observation not only saw an overwrought emotionalism in the speaker's
eloquence, but detected the ring of insincerity in his more lucid speech
and acts. Nevertheless, the hysteria of the preacher was communicated to
the congregation, who wept and shouted with him. Tired and discontented
housewives found their vague sorrows and vaguer longings were only the
result of their "unregenerate" state; the lazy country youths felt
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