Page:Ruth Fielding at Silver Ranch.djvu/172

162 said, softly. "The harm is done, if it is to be done. I'm in here, and I mean to stay with him till you get help and medicine."

"You—you"

"Don't call me names, but get the water. Find a pail somewhere. Bring plenty of cool water. He is burning up with fever and thirst."

"Well, the hawse is stole, I reckon!" grunted the Indian. "But you'd ought to be shaken. What the boss says to me about this will be a-plenty."

"Get the water, Jib!" commanded Ruth Fielding. "See! he breathes so hard. I believe he is dying of thirst more than anything else."

Jib grabbed the canteen that swung at the back of his saddle, emptied the last of the stale water on the ground, and hurried away to where a thin stream tumbled down the hillside behind one of the old shaft openings. He brought the canteen back full—and it held two quarts.

"Just a little at first," said the girl, pouring some of the cool water into her own folding cup that she carried in her pocket. "He mustn't have too much. And you keep out of the house, Jib, no use in both of us running the risk of catching the fever. You'll have to ride for help, too. And you don't want to take the infection among the other boys."

"You are a plucky one, Miss," admitted the