"And comfort of mind," added the captain, about to go.
Ramsey guessed the trouble. "We are veree oblige'," said her mother; "we'll continue on the Votarezz."
"Goody!" murmured the daughter to old Joy, to Hugh, and to the captain as he left the group. "Goody!"
"Mother!" protested the twins, "you must not!"
"Oh-h! you?" she radiantly inquired, "you rather go ashore, you, eh? Veree well. Doubdlezz the captain be please' to put you." Her smile grew stately as Ramsey laughed. She turned to the grandfather. "Never in my life I di'n' ran away from sicknezz. I billieve anybody can't die till his time come'. When his time come' he'll die. My 'usband he billieve that, too."
"Don't the Germans come from Germany?" asked Ramsey, but no one seemed able to tell her.
"And also," pursued the lady, "I billieve tha'z a cowardly—to run away from those sick." She looked around for the twins but they were conferring aside. "And also I billieve, me—like they say—to get scare'—tha'z the sure way to catch that kind of sicknezz. 'Tis by that it pazz into the syztem! My 'usband he tell me that. He's veree acquaint' with medicine, my 'usband, yes! And——"
"Is Germany in Asia?" Ramsey drawled, but nobody seemed to know anything.
"And I billieve," persisted madame, "to continue on the boat, tha'z also the mo' safe. Because if we leave the boat, where we'll find one doctor for that maladee-e? An' if we find one doctor, who's goin' nurse us in that maladee?"
"Is Asia—?" tried Ramsey again, but hushed with a strange thrill as her ear caught, remotely beneath her, a faint sawing and hammering.