Gabbett took another look at the purpling face and the bedewed forehead, and then sprang erect, rubbing at his right hand, as though he would rub off something sticking there.
“He's got the fever!” he roared, with a terror-stricken grimace.
“The what?” asked twenty voices.
“The fever, ye grinning fools!” cried Gabbett. “I've seen it before to-day. The typhus is aboard, and he's the fourth man down!”
The circle of beast-like faces, stretched forward to “see the fight,” widened at the half-uncomprehended, ill-omened word. It was as though a bombshell had fallen into the group. Rufus Dawes lay on the deck motionless, breathing heavily. The savage circle glared at his prostrate body. The alarm ran round, and all the prison crowded down to stare at him. All at once he uttered a groan, and turning, propped his body on his two rigid arms, and made an effort to speak. But no sound issued from his convulsed jaws.
“He's done,” said the Moocher brutally. “He didn't hear nuffin', I'll pound it.”
The noise of the heavy bolts shooting back broke the spell. The first detachment were coming down from “exercise.” The door was flung back, and the bayonets of the guard gleamed in a ray of sunshine that shot down the hatchway. This glimpse of sunlight—sparkling at the entrance of the foetid and stifling prison—seemed to mock their miseries. It was as though Heaven laughed at them. By one of those terrible and strange impulses which animate crowds, the mass, turning from the sick man, leapt towards the doorway. The interior of the prison flashed white with suddenly turned faces. The gloom scintillated with rapidly moving hands. “Air! air! Give us air!”
“That's it!” said Sanders to his companions. “I thought the news would rouse 'em.”
Gabbett—all the savage in his blood stirred by the sight of flashing eyes and wrathful faces—would have thrown himself forward with the rest, but Vetch plucked him back.
“It'll be over in a moment,” he said. “It's only a fit they've got.” He spoke truly. Through the uproar was heard the rattle of iron on iron, as the guard “stood to their arms,” and the wedge of grey cloth broke, in sudden terror of the levelled muskets.