That night, when Dannie went to bed, his pulse was beating rapidly, his face was flushed, his head was very hot and heavy, and he was troubled with a hacking cough. He did not complain of any pain, except the soreness and constant aching of all his joints and muscles; but that was due, he thought, to the violent effort necessary to force his way through the drifts the day before. Aunt Martha saw, however, that beyond the mere fact of physical fatigue, the boy was ill; and she insisted upon putting him to bed in the large guest-chamber adjoining her own sleeping room on the ground floor, where a fire could be kept burning on the hearth, and she could give him constant attention by night and day. He demurred to this arrangement at first, but soon, through sheer weariness, he yielded; and it was not long after his head touched the pillow, before he was fast asleep. Later in the night he appeared to be troubled and restless, and turned constantly in his bed, asking frequently for water. Aunt Martha tried to allay his fever with some simple remedies, but she found that her efforts were in vain. Early in the morning she awoke Abner Pickett and told him that Dannie was ill. He dressed himself, came in and looked at the boy, and saw, at the first glance, that the services of a physician were needed. Before daylight Gabriel was on his way to Port Lenox to summon Dr. Chubbuck, and at nine o’clock the doctor came. He was short and stout, and red in the face, and carried with him always an air of joviality. But when he came out from the sick room he looked grave. “What is it, Doctor?” inquired Abner Pickett, anxiously. The doctor sat down by the table and unlocked his medicine chest before replying. He was always deliberate with his answers. “I’m afraid it’s pneumonia,” he said finally. “One lung seems to be pretty badly involved. I guess we’ll pull him through, though.” He weighed out the medicine and divided the powder into separate doses. “Give him one every three hours.” Then he added, “Martha’s been telling me what he did Tuesday. What under the canopy possessed him to paddle through that storm to Mooreville, I can’t see. Why, he might have died of exhaustion. As it is he--well, we’ll do what we can for him.” He turned his attention then to the compounding of a liquid prescription. “Give him a teaspoonful every hour,” he directed, “till you get his pulse down to something reasonable--say a hundred and twenty. How’s the lawsuit going to come out, Abner?” “I don’t know, an’ I don’t much care if you’ll only pull this boy through.” “Just so. Do the best we can, of course. Nice boy; hate to lose him. I don’t think you’ll have any particular trouble to-night, though, and I’ll come up in the morning again and see how he is.”