Part 7 (1/2)
Tho a foolish question
”_Si_ Swamp fever, yellow fever, smallpox, beriberi--to-day we live, to-morroe are dead”
”True for ye They's allays somethin' hidin' round the corner waitin' to ju, it's another”
Despite his philosophical answer, however, Ti to the doors of the roo Like most men in whose veins red blood runs bold and free, he had no fear of the sort of death befitting a fighter--sudden and violent--but a deep repugnance for those two assassins against which a victiht back--disease and poison The Brazilian youth's nonchalant fatalism aroused him to the fact that here both those forms of death were very near hiround--fever and snakes
For the moment he was depressed Then curiosity awoke
”If this here, now, Javary fever ain't catchin', how does a feller git it?”
”Mosquitoes,” McKay enlightened him ”The _anopheles_ It bites a man who has fever, then bites a well man and leaves the fever in hie dose of quinine right away Mosquito attacks perpendicular to the skin That is, it stands on its head If you ever notice one of theet busy with the quinine”
”Huh! Fat chance a feller's got o' seein' just how all these bugs bite him And one muskeeter standin' on its head does all that, hey?”
”So they say Also they say it's only the fe more 'n once by females before now
How about the yeller fever? Git that the saoet beriberi you're gone, too First syers and toes Muscular paralysis goes on until your heart stops”
”Uh-huh Nice cheerful place to die in, this Ale Aell, what's the odds?”
Wherewith he inhaled arette butt at a small lizard on the floor not far away, yawned once :
”And when I die Don't bury me a-tall, But pickle me bones In alky-hawl--”
When his roar had subsided and the two for over his nocturnal adventures, the door of Schwandorf's rooen_,” he grunted, striding to the table ”Thomaz!”
”_Si_, Senhor Sssondoff” The youth faded away into the kitchen quarters
”Always feel gruruarette breakfast for ar--then I feel huaze never flickered as it encountered Knowlton's
”Fine If you snored I didn't know it Didn't hear the bodies taken out this , either”
”Bodies! Oh! Those fellows dead?” He tilted his head toward the doors behind which the sick men had lain ”Glad of it Best for them and everybody else Hate to have sick people in the place”
The Aarettes and waited for the other to becoin-flavored coffee had disappeared, and his big cigar was aglow, he did
”Well, gentleood advice and let your Raposa alone?” he asked, affably