CHAPTER X.
LATE that afternoon Jeb returned to the house after several hours of uneasy, aimless pottering about at barn and woodshed.
He stumped and stamped around the kitchen, then in the sitting-room, finally he mustered the courage to look into the bedroom, from which he had slunk like a criminal three hours before.

There she lay, apparently in the same position.

Her waxen color and her absolute stillness added fear to his sense of guilt--a guilt against which he protested, because he felt he had simply done what God and man expected of him.

He stood in the low doorway for some time, stood there peering and craning until his fear grew so great that he could no longer put off ending or confirming it.
"Sleepin' ?" said he in a hoarse undertone.
She did not reply; she did not move.

He could not see that she was breathing.
"It'll soon be time to git supper," he went on--not because he was thinking of supper but because he was desperately clutching for something that must draw a reply from her--if she could reply.
"Want me to clean up the dinner and put the supper things on ?" She made a feeble effort to rise, sank back again.