“A what?”
“They get at you and hurt you.”
“Who said so?”
“Mamie.”
“Are you scared of germs?”
The White Hope nodded gravely.
“I have to be sterilized because of them. Are you sterilized?”
“Nobody ever told me so. But, say, kid, you don’t want to be frightened of germs or microbes or bacilli or any of the rest of the circus. You don’t want to be frightened of nothing. You’re the White Hope, the bear-cat that ain’t scared of anything on earth. What’s this germ thing like, anyway?”
“It’s a——I’ve never seen one, but Mamie says they get at you and hurt you. I think it’s a kind of big sort of ugly man that creeps in when you’re asleep.”
“So that’s why you thought I was one?”