Her woes and his relief made Patty social, yet tender, and the instincts
of her sex had returned, to be petted and beloved.
"Oh, Captain," she said, fondly, "how clean and sweet you look, like my
good man again. Don't be cross to me, Van Dorn! My heart is sad."
"_Chito_, Patty! _chito_! Fie! _you_ sad? I like to see you saucy and
defiant. Let us not repent! So Joe has left you?"
"With cruel curses. My daughter hates me, he says, and means to be a
lady where I can't disgrace her. Oh, honey! to raise a child and have it
hate an' despise you goes hard, even if I have been bad. There's nothing
left me now but you, Van Dorn; oh, do not die!"
He coughed carefully, as if coughing was a luxury to be very mildly
exerted, and wiped a little blood from his tongue and lip.
"I'll try not to die till I comfort you some, _Marta delicioso_! The
ball is at my windpipe, and, when the blood trickles in, it makes me
cough, and I must beware of emotions, the surgeon says, lest it drop
into my lung and break a blood-vessel by some very spasmodic cough. So
do not be too beautiful or I might perish."
He stroked his long yellow mustache with the diamond-fingered hand, and
drew his velvet smoking-cap tight upon his silken curls, but he was too
pale to blush as formerly, though he lisped as much, like a modest boy.
"Captain," the woman said, pleased to crimson, "you are so much smarter
than me I'm afeard of you.
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