"I have the fear thad's going to go hahd with my wife, being of the
Nawth."
"Why, what's going to go hard, old fellow?"
"The feveh. My dear frien', don't I know tha'z the only thing would keep heh f'om me thad long?"
"Still, you don't know her case will be a hard one; it may be very light.
But don't talk now."
"Well—I hope so. Me, I wou'n' take ten thousand dollahs faw thad feveh myself—to see that devotion of my wife. You muz 'ave observe', eh?"
"Yes, indeed, old man; nobody could help observing. I wouldn't talk any more just now."
"No," he insisted, "nobody could eveh doubt. 'Action speak loudeh than word,' eh?"
"Yes, but we don't want either from you just now." I put his restless arms back under the cover; not to keep the outer temperature absolutely even was counted a deadly risk. "Besides," I said, "you're talking out of character, old boy."
He looked at me mildly, steadily, for several moments, as if something about me gave him infinite comfort. It was a man's declaration of love to a man, and as he read the same in my eyes, he closed his own and drowsed.
Though he dozed only at wide intervals and briefly, he asked no more questions until night; then—"Who's with my wife?"