Then Mother saw me shake, and she said, “What's the matter? Are you cold?”
“Y-y-yes'm,” I said. Well, it wasn't a lie. I was sort of cold.
“Father, the poor child is sick,” Mother said. “See him chatter his teeth.”
So Father looked at me. “Malaria,” he said. So he asked me if I had been up to the Slough, because he had been reading in a magazine about Slough mosquitoes biting you and giving you malaria. I didn't know what to say. It didn't look good to say I had been up there so near the old shanty boat, and I didn't like to lie about it, because I was on probation for getting religion. So I didn't say anything. I just shivered and chattered my teeth.
“Huh!” my father said. “I knew well enough something was the matter with that boy when he got religion. He's had this malaria spell coming on. Put him to bed and give him a big dose of quinine.” And then he said to me, “Just let me catch you up near that Slough again, understand? Get to bed, and quick! This family is just one thing after another!”
I got to bed pretty quick and Mother gave me one of the big capsules. She heated the scorched blanket at the kitchen stove and wrapped me up in it and put all the bed covers she could find on top of me. I started to sweat right away. So she said, “If you want anything I'll leave the door open and you can call me,” and she went down again. She told Father she guessed I was pretty sick because I looked like it, and all he said was, “Huh! boys!” And I guessed he was right, and I made up my mind to live a better and truer life, but I kept thinking of the man we had killed. I never sweat so much in my life.
All at once the doorbell rang and I sat right up in bed. I thought the police had come for me. But it wasn't the police; it was something just as bad—almost. It was old Higgins, the skiff man. He was talking to Father. He asked him if I had got home all right. So Father said I had, and I was sick and in bed. Then old Higgins said, “Well, I don't know what to make of it. Nobody brought my skiff back. Your boy and two other boys hired it off of me, and when it got late and they didn't bring it back I got frightened. You ask him where he left my skiff, and if they lost it somebody's got to pay me back for it.” Well, I was mighty scared. I guessed Bony had been so scared he had upset the skiff and got drowned, and maybe me and Swatty would get hung for that, too, though we did throw rocks at Bony to try to get him to come back. But, anyway, me and Swatty would have to tell why Bony had gone off in the skiff alone, and then they would know everything, and take us to jail and hang us. I crawled down under the covers and pretended to be asleep, but it wasn't any use, because Father shook me by the shoulder.
“Now, what?” he said, cross. “Here's Higgins, the skiff man, and he says you hired a skiff and didn't bring it back. What's the meaning of all this? And are you putting on this malaria on this account? Explain, young man!”
So I sat up and I said, “Bony took it.”
“Come, now, explain!” my father said.