My new job, after the usual chores were done, was to sit with Snow, try to feed her, try to tempt her into eating, bring her water, tend to her wounds. She was pitifully dependant on me now, and cried for me if I left her. Sometimes she would stand up a little, nibble a little, but mostly, she looked miserable and moaned quietly.

Mark came to visit us, and he immediately offered to pay for the necessary vet care required to save her life, but Dad refused. The vet had said it would be $75 to help her, which didn't seem like much to me, considering how extensive the injuries were, but of course, it was out of the question to take her to the vet. I could not understand why my parents would not let Mark help her. He loved animals, hated to see them suffer, and he didn't stay very long the day he saw her.

After several days, her body began to smell. I noticed white specks in the open part of her body, the part where I could actually see her exposed leg muscles moving and flexing. Within a day or two, it became apparent that the white specks were maggots. I was horrified. I watched as they burrowed deep into her, as her wound widened with their onslaught. I have heard that maggots only eat dead flesh, but this is not what I saw at all. Mom insisted that I had to do something about the maggots. I didn't have any idea of what could be done. There were hundreds and hundreds of them, and more flies coming to lay new eggs all the time. It was the nastiest thing I had ever seen. Then Mom said that what I had to do was to boil up some salt water and pour that, straight off the stove, into her wound, because that would kill the maggots and help Snow heal. This seemed like a dubious and cruel idea to me, but Mom insisted, told me I was neglecting to care for my animal, that the maggots were eating her alive, which they were. I reluctantly boiled water, stirred salt in until it dissolved, walked outside with the still-hot pan, and poured it into my goat's wound. She screamed and tried to move away, but it had all been poured in already. I was horrified by what I had done. I watched to see if the maggots were still alive. They didn't even seem phased. As far as I could tell, the only effect of this "treatment" was to cause my doe incredible pain. I didn't repeat it.

After days, then a week, then longer, Snow slowly went downhill. She was fighting valiantly, as I could never have imagined any animal could, but she looked a little more defeated every day. The maggots ate into her, her wounds festered, rotted, and stank, and she quit eating, only drinking now. I sat with her every day, feeling useless and impotent to help her. After two full weeks of this, Dad loaded her into a truck, took her off to a slash pile, shot her, and covered her up with brush and slash. I was relieved. I wasn't that I was happy to see her die, but her suffering seemed pointless, hopeless. I wondered why it had taken two whole weeks to decide that this was the humane thing to do.