"What do you think of that?" he asked, watching me anxiously. "Looks pretty good?"
"Fine," I said, hating to disappoint him, although I never eat sardines, and bananas give me indigestion, "I'm hungry enough to eat a raw Italian."
"Then fall to," he directed, and with a flourish he drew a bottle of ginger ale from his pocket.
"How's this?" he demanded, holding it up. "Cheers but doesn't inebriate; not a headache in a barrel; ginger ale to the gingery! 'A quart of ale is a dish for a king,'" he said, holding up a glass. "That's Shakespeare, Miss Minnie."
I was a good bit more cheerful when I'd choked down the sandwich, especially when he assured me the water was all right—"a little high, as you might say, but not poisonous. Lord, I wish you could have seen them staggering into my office!"
"I saw enough," I said with a shiver.
"That German, von Inwald," he went on, "he's the limit. He accused us of poisoning him for reasons of state!"
"Where are they now?"
"My dear girl," he answered, putting down his glass, "what has been pounded into me ever since I struck the place? The baths! I prescribe 'em all day and dream 'em all night. Where are the poisonees now? They are steaming, stewing, exuding in the hot rooms of the bath department—all of them, every one of them! In the hold and the hatches down!"
He picked up the pail and went down the steps to the spring.