nto whose eyes sprang joy
at the sight of Jees Uck. As for Amos, the very thought of the girl was
sufficient to send his blood pounding up into a hemorrhage.

Jees Uck, whose mind was simple, who thought elementally and was unused
to weighing life in its subtler quantities, read Amos Pentley like a
book. She warned Bonner, openly and bluntly, in few words; but the
complexities of higher existence confused the situation to him, and he
laughed at her evident anxiety. To him, Amos was a poor, miserable
devil, tottering desperately into the grave. And Bonner, who had
suffered much, found it easy to forgive greatly.

But one morning, during a bitter snap, he got up from the breakfast-table
and went into the store. Jees Uck was already there, rosy from the
trail, to buy a sack of flour. A few minutes later, he was out in the
snow lashing the flour on her sled. As he bent over he noticed a
stiffness in his neck and felt a premonition of impending physical
misfortune. And as he put the last half-hitch into the lashing and
attempted to straighten up, a quick spasm seized him and he sank into the
snow. Tense and quivering, head jerked back, limbs extended, back arched
and mouth twisted and distorted, he appeared as though being racked limb
from limb. Without cry or sound, Jees Uck was in the snow beside him;
but he clutched both her wrists spasmodically, and as long as the
convulsion endured she was helpless. In a few moments the spasm relaxed
and he was left weak and fainting, his forehead beaded with sweat, and
his lips flecked with foam.

"Quick!" he muttered, in a strange, hoarse voice. "Quick! Inside!"

He started to crawl on hands and knees, but she raised him up, and,
supported by her young arm, he made faster progress. As he entered the
store the spasm seized him again, and his body writhed irresistibly away
from her and rolled and curled on the floor. Amos Pentley came and
looked on with curious eyes.

"Oh, Amos!" she cried in an agony of apprehension and helplessness, "him
die, you think?" But Amos shrugged his shoulders and continued to look
on.

Bonner's body went slack, the tense muscles easing down and an expression
of relief coming into his face. "Quick!" he gritted between his teeth,
his mouth twisting with the on-coming of the next spasm and with his
effort to control it. "Quick, Jees Uck! The medicine! Never mind! Drag
me!"

She knew where the medicine-chest stood, at the rear of the