CABIN FEVER By B. M. Bower CONTENTS CHAPTER I THE FEVER MANIFESTS ITSELF II TWO MAKE A QUARREL III TEN DOLLARS AND A JOB FOR BUD IV HEAD SOUTH AND KEEP GOING V BUD CANNOT PERFORM MIRACLES VI BUD TAKES TO THE HILLS VII INTO THE DESERT VIII MANY BARREN MONTHS AND MILES IX THE BITE OF MEMORY X EMOTIONS ARE TRICKY THINGS XI THE FIRST STAGES XII MARIE TAKES A DESPERATE CHANCE XIII CABIN FEVER IN ITS WORST FORM XIV CASH GETS A SHOCK XV AND BUD NEVER GUESSED XVI THE ANTIDOTE XVII LOVIN CHILD WRIGGLES IN XVIII THEY HAVE THEIR TROUBLES XIX BUD FACES FACTS XX LOVIN CHILD STRIKES IT RICH XXI MARIE'S SIDE OF IT XXII THE CURE COMPLETE CABIN FEVER CHAPTER ONE. THE FEVER MANIFESTS ITSELF There is a certain malady of the mind induced by too much of one thing. Just as the body fed too long upon meat becomes a prey to that horrid disease called scurvy, so the mind fed too long upon monotony succumbs to the insidious mental ailment which the West calls “cabin fever.” True, it parades under different names, according to circumstances and caste. You may be afflicted in a palace and call it ennui, and it may drive you to commit peccadillos and indiscretions of various sorts. You may be attacked in a middle-class apartment house, and call it various names, and it may drive you to cafe life and affinities and alimony. You may have it wherever you are shunted into a backwater of life, and lose the sense of being borne along in the full current of progress. Be sure that it will make you abnormally sensitive to little things; irritable where once you were amiable; glum where once you went whistling about your work and your play. It is the crystallizer of character, the acid test of friendship, the final seal set upon enmity. It will betray your little, hidden weaknesses, cut and polish your undiscovered virtues, reveal you in all your glory or your vileness to your companions in exile--if so be you have any. If you would test the soul of a friend, take him into the wilderness and rub elbows with him for five months! One of three things will surely happen: You will hate each other afterward with that enlightened hatred which is seasoned with contempt; you will emerge with the contempt tinged with a pitying toleration, or you will be close, unquestioning friends to the last six feet of earth--and beyond. All these things will cabin fever do, and more. It has committed murder, many's the time. It has driven men crazy. It has warped and distorted character out of all semblance to its former self. It has sweetened love and killed love. There is an antidote--but I am going to let you find the antidote somewhere in the story.