For a time Ben seemed brighter and walked back to the stable without resting on the way, took a long drink of water, swallowed his medicine without a struggle, and fell into a doze.
In the afternoon he waked, tried to drink the soup Miss Jule brought him, and could not, neither could he swallow water, though he gratefully licked a bit of ice his mistress gave him. Then when pain seized him and his sunken eyes told of suffering, she put hot cloths upon his stomach and gently rubbed his head which laid in her lap.
The surgeon came at evening, looked sober, but said to keep on with the medicine, and that Ben would probably improve the next morning.
That night the horses in the stable saw an odd sight—fat, middle-aged Miss Jule, buttoned to the chin in an old ulster with a crimson wool Tam O’ Shanter cap of Letty’s fastened on askew, was sitting on an upturned pail in the box stall beside her sick friend, while for company, Martin, the reliable, slept on a heap of hay in a distant corner, wrapped in a carriage robe.
Mr. Hugh had offered to stay with Ben in Miss Jule’s place and Letty to watch with her, but a grim “No” had been her answer.
In the middle of the night Ben grew worse, and in spite of his courage he groaned with pain, and stretched his paws to his mistress as if for help, but could not otherwise move. She roused Martin and sent him to telephone the doctor, but the answer came that he was out and might not return until morning.
Miss Jule had felt from the first that Ben was fatally ill; now she questioned herself as to how far she should allow him to suffer under the chance that he might recover for a time, and thus spare her pain.
More time passed, again he stretched out his paws and turned a pitiful look upon her that said, “Help me, mistress, I cannot bear the pain.”
“Yes, old fellow, missy will help you. Put your head down and I will rub it—so. Martin, go to my locked closet and bring me the bottle labelled chloroform. Yes, that is right; now that horse sponge there and the bit of newspaper.” She took the bottle with a hand that shook, poured some upon the sponge that she had thrust in a cone made of twisted paper. Then she raised the feverish nose resting upon her knee and gently covered it saying softly, “Good-by my Ben, good-by dear Mr. Wolf.” That was all.
A healthy animal often struggles at the scent of chloroform, but to the very ill it brings swift peace. Ben Uncas was in the happy hunting-grounds which were not far away. Then brave Miss Jule broke down and laid her head upon the tawny one and sobbed aloud. She was sitting thus when the doctor, having received her summons on his tardy return home, crossed the floor with rapid tread.