“How provoking of me to trip on my gown,” she said, looking up at him sullenly. “Do you think we shall have snow to-morrow?”
“I shall pray against a precipitation of icebergs,” said Adam. “There is nothing suggestive of love in ice.”
CHAPTER VII.
A BEEF-EATER PASSES.
The rigors of the London winter pursued the beef-eaters relentlessly, tapping them remindfully on the shoulder, now and again, with a cold, or a spell of bronchitis, and then, under cover of a fog, some deadly affliction fastened upon the pair all at once. The rover found them, after an absence from their quarters of two days, so ill that first one and then the other was crawling from his bed to minister to his comrade, so that both grew rapidly worse.
Adam looked at the two of them ruefully, when at length he came to where they were. He had never known them ill in this manner before. They cared nothing for eating; they slept but little. Their eyes were bright. They were perfectly cheerful, in a feeble sort of way. After the Sachem had come they declared they wanted for nothing, provided he would talk to them, sing a little and let them lie there and see him, or hear him play on his favorite violin.
He brought them every comfort which money could buy. He cooked for them, served them and ate at their board—which was a board indeed, reaching from one bed to the other, where they could easily get at what he spread on its surface for their pleasure. But the choice wines he fetched, and the fruits and the delicate bits of game and fish, remained almost wholly untasted.
Adam was soon at a loss to know what to do. He tried to get at their symptoms.
“Pike, you rogue,” he said, “I want to know where you feel bad. You are ill, you know; now where is the pain?”
“By my sword-stroke,” said Pike, in a worn-down voice, “I have no pain. I may be tired, to-day, but to-morrow, bring me a pirate and I shall eat him without the trouble of slicing him first.”