"What do you think?"
"Nothing. The time hasn't come for thinking."
He bent his emotionless eye closer on the big rancher.
"You," he said, "ought to be in bed this moment."
Drew waved the suggestion aside.
"Let me give you a sedative," added Young.
"Nonsense. I'm going to stay here."
The doctor gave up the effort; dismissed Drew from his mind, and focused his glance on the patient once more. Calamity Ben was moving his head restlessly from side to side, keeping up a gibbering mutter. It rose now to words.
"Joe, a mule is to a hoss what a woman is to a man. Ever notice? The difference ain't so much in what they do as what they don't do. Me speakin' personal, I'll take a lot from any hoss and lay it to jest plain spirit; but a mule can make me mad by standin' still and doin' nothing but wablin' them long ears as if it understood things it wasn't goin' to speak about. Y' always feel around a mule as if it knew somethin' about you—had somethin' on you—and was laughin' soft and deep inside. Damn a mule! I remember—"
But here he sank into the steady, voiceless whisper again, the shadow of a sound rather than the reality. It was ghostly to hear, even by daylight.