Then all was dark again, and he seemed to be dreaming of the fever and the doctor that was talking to him and telling him that there were six of the men just as bad as he was, and that he was to take that. He could think now, for he distinctly heard him say:
“Tip it up. It will do you good.”
And somehow the engines seemed to have been stopped, and he felt as if he was being lifted on to some one’s arm away from the tremendous heat of the engine fires, and he knew it was the Doctor—good old Morley!—who was holding a very hard wooden cup to his lips for him to drink the medicine. No, it was not nasty; it was beautifully cool and good. He felt that the Doctor had put in so much water that he could not taste the physic; and he drank on and on, every drop seeming to make it easier at last to think. And then the cup was being taken from his lips, and he tried to raise his hand to catch it and hold it so that he might drink more; but his arm fell as if nerveless, and he uttered a deep groan.
“Oh, come!” rose to his ears now, as if from a long way off. “That’s something! Ain’t going to die this time.”
“Not going to die this time,” some one whispered, as if it were breathed with a hot breath upon his lips; and then he lay thinking in a very feeble way, and feeling the while so tired, as a great longing came over him to go to sleep. It seemed like hours before that longing was fulfilled; and then he woke up not knowing why or wherefore, or grasping anything but that it was dark, black dark; and then he felt, with a strange sense of agony, that all his trouble was returning, for the trumpeting roar thundered through his brain, and he lay perfectly still as the deep sound ceased, ending with a peculiar kind of snort and a squeal, feeling that there was no pain, and beginning to wonder why.
Time passed again—how long a time it was beyond him to grasp—but there was that peculiar trumpeting roar once more, and somehow it did not trouble him so much. The fancy that he was in the Lion House had faded away, and he became conscious of the Doctor passing his arm under his neck and raising him, while the wooden cup was being held to his lips—cool, sweet, delicious—it was one great joy to feel the soft draught running over his parched tongue and down his throat.
Then he started, and he felt some of the contents of the cup trickle down his chin, for there was a shrill trumpeting noise again as the desire to exert himself came, and he exclaimed:
“What’s that?”
It was only in a whisper, but the Doctor—no, it was not the Doctor; it was some one whose voice he knew—said excitedly:
“Helephants.” And then, “I say, Mister Archie, sir, you’re a-coming round!”