Day by day she sent for him, and when he came, assumed a new character,
that of a woman humbled by a sense of her own ignorance, which she was
anxious to amend. So he must play the role of tutor to her, telling her
of civilized peoples, their laws, customs and religions, and instructing
her how to write and read. She listened and learned submissively enough,
but all the while Alan felt as one might who is called upon to teach
tricks to a drugged panther. The drug in this case was her passion for
him, which appeared to be very genuine. But when it passed off, or when
he was obliged to refuse her, what, he wondered, would happen then?
Anxiety and confinement told on him far more than all the hardships of
his journey. His health ran down, he began to fall ill. Then as bad luck
would have it, walking in that damp, unwholesome cedar garden, out of
which he might not stray, he contracted the germ of some kind of fever
which in autumn was very common in this poisonous climate. Three days
later he became delirious, and for a week after that hung between life
and death. Well was it for him that his medicine-chest still remained
intact, and that recognizing his own symptoms before his head gave way,
he was able to instruct Jeekie what drugs to give him at the different
stages of the disease.
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