The old red terrier slept with Jacob, and his basket was pulled out from a pile of odds and ends and taken up to the bedroom. He crept up after his master—a melancholy dog, strange to his surroundings.
"Poor 'Jacko' will soon settle down," said Auna. "Don't forget to put him a drop of water in the soap-dish, father."
Jacob kissed Auna and went up the little stone stairs to his chamber. He was very stiff.
"Look in upon me the last thing," he said, "and bring me up another drop of drink. Make it hot, there's a dear."
He was suffering from slight rigours when she brought him the liquor but Auna did not observe them.
CHAPTER X
FEVER
Auna went early next morning to see her father, and found him sick.
"I'm very bad," he said, "with chills and heats all night, and stiff in knees and ankles and wrists. It's like that burn-gout Billy had, I fear, only it torments all the joints so sharply that I can't bear the bedclothes upon me."
His face told of pain. As yet he seemed more surprised than alarmed that sickness should have fallen so suddenly upon him. He shrank from her touch and feared even her light hand as she pulled the tumbled coverlet.