Page:The Keeper of the Bees.pdf/61

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THE BEE MASTER
45

after a mile or two, he was forced to walk again. But he was thankful for the offer and dimly he was beginning to formulate in his mind the feeling that the world is made up of good people and bad people, of selfish people and thoughtful people, of cruel people and kind people, and it was merely a case of luck as to which kind you met when you went on a great adventure.

From the Ranger on, Jamie’s adventure stretched lagging miles of torture, still west by south, until nearly three o’clock that afternoon. Nobody had left a lunch box and there had been no place where the few pennies he carried would buy food. He had left the canyon and followed a road that had widened until it would accommodate horses and vehicles, here and there a car—not a greatly travelled road; not a busy, well-kept road; a road that became increasingly more difficult for Jamie to follow because his feet had endured almost all that human feet can endure when they are attached to a sick man who is gamely driving himself to the ultimate limit.

Near four o’clock the hunger that had been in abeyance since the night before began again to torment him. He was exhausted to the point at which he found himself taking two or three sidewise steps to keep from lifting his feet even a slight degree higher to step over a small irregularity in the road. He was beginning to realize that there was slight chance of shelter for the night. There was equally small chance of food. So far his adventure had yielded its bright spots, its thrills, its pains. At that minute, between the scorching in his breast and the burn-