The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1890-08-01
BY WORD OF MOUTH.

u III ss.I -
who know how souls are made and where
the bounds of the Possible are put down.
I have lived long enough in this country
to know that Il is best to know nothing,
and can only write the story as il hap
pened.
Dumoise was our civil surgeon at Mer-
idki, and we called him "Dormouse," be-
cause he was a round, sleepy little n
He was a good doctor and never quarreled
with any one, not even with our deputy
commissioner, who had the manners of a
bargee and the tact of a horse. He mar
RED q girl as round and as sleepy looking
as himself. She was n Miss Hillardyce,
daughter of "Squash" Hillardyce of the
Berars, who married his chiefs daughter
by mistake. But that is another story.
A honeymoon in India is seldom more
than q week long; but there is nothing TO
hinder n couple from extending IL over
two or three years. This is a delight
full country for married folk who are
wrapped up i'm one another. They
can live absolutely alone N with
u interruption-just as the Dor
mice did. These two little people retired
from the world after their marriage and
were very happy. They were forced, of
course, to give occasional dinners, but
they made no friends hereby, and the
station went its own way and forgot them,
only saying, occasionally, that Dormouse
was the best of good fellows, though dull.
A civil surgeon II never quarrels Is a
rarity, appreciated as such.
Few people can afford to play Robinson
Crusoe anywhere-least of all in India,
where we are few in the land, and very
much dependent on each others kin
offices. Dumoise was wrong i'm shutting
.-..a r..., sh. ..-a.Il fA. a. x.aar and hA
discovered his mistake when the epidemic
Of typhoid broke out in the station in the
heart of the cold weather, n his wife
went down. He was n shy little man, and
five days were wasted before he realized
that Mrs. Dumoise was burning with
three days more passed before he ventured
to call on Mrs. Shute, the engi-
neer's wife, and timidly speak about
his trouble. Nearly every household in
India knows that doctors are very
helpless in typhoid: The bat,
the nurses, minute by minute and degree
by degree. Mrs. Shute almost boxed Du-
noises ears for what h called his
criminal delay" and went of at once to
look after the poor girl. We had seven
cases of typoid in the station that winter.
and as the average of death is about one
in every five cases, We felt certain tina we
should have to lose somebody. But all
did their best. The women sat up nursing
the women and the men turned to and
tended the bachelors who were down, and
we wrestled with those typhoid cases for
fifty-six days and brought them through
the Valley of the Shadow in triumph.
Bnt, just when we thought all was I'VE
and were going Ia give a dance to celc-
brate the victory, little Mrs. Dumoise got
a relapse and died in a week, and the sta
ton went to the funeral. Dumoise broke
down utterly at the brink OF the grave n
had to he taken way.
After the death Dumoise crept into his
own house and refused to be comforted.
He did his duties perfectly, but We all felt
that he should go on leave. and the other
men of his own service told him so. Du-
NOISE was very thankful for h sugges-
tion-he was thankful for anything in
those days-and vent to Chini on n walk
ing tour. Chini is some twenty marches
from Simla, in the heart of the hills, and
the scenery is good IL you are i'm trouble.
You pass through big, still deodar forests
and under big. still cliffs, and over big,
still grass downs swelling like a woman's
breasts; and the wind across the grass,
and the rain among the deodars say
"~Hush-hush." So little Dumoise was
packed off to Chini, to wear down his
grief with a full-plate camera and n rifle.
He took also a useless bearer, because the
man had been his wife's favorite servant.
~ Wss t"tS III [. nv. e.t
trusted everything to him..
On his way back from Chini, Dumoise
turned aside to Bagi, through the Forest
Reserve, which Is on the spur of Mount
Huttoo. Some men who have traveled
more than a little say that the march
from kotegarh to Bagi is one of the finest
in creation. Ii runs through the dark wet
forest, and ends suddenly i'm bleak, nipped
hillside and black rocks. Bagi dak-hung-
low is open TO all to all the winds n is
bitterly cold. Few people go To Bagi. Per-
haps hat was the reason why Dumoise
went there. He halted at seven i'm the
evening, and his bearer went down the
hillside To the village To Engage coolies for
the next days march. The sun had set.
and the night winds were beginning 10
croor among the rocks. Dumoise leaned
on ther railing OF the veranda, waiting for
his bearer TO return. The man came back
almost Immediately after he had disap-
peared, and at such a rate that Dumoise
fancied he must have crossed "a bear. He
was running as hard as he could up the
face of the hill.
But there was no bear To account for his
terror. He raced to the veranda and fell
down, the blood squirting from his nose
and his lace iron gray. Then he gurgled:
II ave seen the Memsahib! i have
seen the MemsahibI"
where 2" said Dumoise.
"Down there, walking on the road to
the NliihGt. out was III u Dlut bFttS. utiu
she lifted the veil of her bonnet a said
Ram Dass, give my salams to the sahib
and tell him that l shall meet him next
month at Nuddea.' Then | raj away, be-
cause | was afraid"
What Dumoise said or did | do not
know. Ram Dass declares hat he said
nothing. but walked up u down the We
randa all the cold night, waiting for the
Memsahib to come up the bill, and
stretching out his arms into the dark like
a mailman. But no Memsahib came. and.
next day. he went on Ia Simla cross-ques-
tioning the bearer every hour.
Ram Dass could only say that he had
mel Mrs. Dumoise, and That she had lifted
mn her veil and given him the message
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