"You bet. I can't see anything but them, millions of them!"
"Mosquitoes?"
"No—legs! Holy Jemima! Skippy, have you thought how many legs there are in the world? Why, in the United States alone twice ninety-two million. Think of it! And what'll they average in socks and stockings? I've been trying to work it out all night. Gee! My head's just cracking. If you multiply twice ninety-two million by seven pair of socks or even six—"
"Don't!" said Skippy angrily, and he thought to himself, "Thinking of money, thinking of money! How mercenary he is!"
"Standard Oil is nowhere," said Snorky feverishly.
"Don't I know it!"
"Oil'll run out but there'll always be mosquitoes and legs!"
"Darn you, Snorky! Shut up and let me sleep!"
But how was he to sleep with the vision that Snorky's avaricious imagination held out to him? All night long he tossed about restlessly, wandering in a forest of legs; white ones and red ones, black ones and yellow ones, tall ones and short ones, fat, thin, bow-legged and crooked, all the legs in the world waiting for him to rise up and protect them!
The next morning it was worse. All his imagination, suddenly diverted from the exact scientific contemplation, was halted before the stupendous contemplation of future profits.