“To the druggist’s.”
“To the druggist’s?”
“Yes. To get some quinine.”
We must confess that the child had not enjoyed the quinine powders which she had previously taken, but as she considered them a panacea for all the ills flesh is heir to, she sighed and said:
“I know you have no more quinine.”
Stasch lifted one of the jars to the light and said with pride and joy:
“What do you call this, then?”
Nell would not believe her eyes, so he continued hastily, brimming over with pleasure:
“Now you are going to get well again! I will lose no time in wrapping a good dose up in the skin of a fresh fig, and you must swallow it, and what you will drink later remains to be seen. Why do you stare at me like an idiot? Yes, I have a second jar, too. I received both of them from a white man, whose camp is about four miles from here. It is from him that I have come. His name is Linde, and he is wounded, but he gave me many nice things to bring back. I returned on horseback, although I went on foot. Do you think it is pleasant to go through the jungle by night? Brr! I would not go a second time unless it were a matter of getting quinine.”
With these words he left the astonished girl, went to the men’s quarters, and selecting the smallest fig from the provisions, hollowed it out and poured quinine into it, but he was very careful that the dose was larger than the powders he had taken in Khartum. Then he left the tree, poured the tea into a pot of boiling water, and returned to Nell with the medicine.