The Colossus | Page 8

he began to tell me that I must put aside foolishness; but I am beginning to feel like a man now."
"You will need to feel like one when you take up your new responsibilities. You are playing now, but it may be serious enough after a while."
"What! Don't preach, Hank. Responsibilities! Why, I'll throw them over my shoulder like a twine string. But let me tell you something. There's one thing I'm not going to allow--they shan't say a word against that old man. Oh, I know the trouble and grief he brought about, but by gracious, he had a cause. If--if--mother didn't love him, why did she say that if he didn't love her she would go away somewhere and grieve herself to death? That was no way to treat a fellow, especially a fellow that loves you like the mischief. And besides, why did father cut him out? Pretty mean thing for a man to slip around and steal his brother's sweetheart. In this country it would mean blood."
"You are a jewel, my boy."
"No, I'm simply just. Of course, two wrongs don't make a right, as the saying has it, but a wrong with a cause is half-way right, and I'll tell them at the very start that they better not talk about the matter. In fact, I told them so in the letter. You've had a pretty hard time of it, haven't you, Hank?"
"I shouldn't want an enemy's dog to have a harder one," DeGolyer answered.
"But you've got a good education."
"So has the hog that picks up cards and tells the time of day," said DeGolyer, "but what good does that do him? He has to work harder than other hogs, and is kept hungry so that he may perform with more sprightliness. But if I have a good education, my boy, I stole it, and I shouldn't be surprised at any time to meet an officer with a warrant of arrest sworn out against me by society."
"Good; but you didn't steal trash at any rate. But, Hank, you look for the dark when the light would serve you better. Don't do it. Throw off your trouble."
"Oh, I'm not disposed to look so much for the dark as you may imagine. Throw it off! That's good advice. It is true that we may sometimes throw off a trouble, but we can't very well throw off a cause. Some natures are like a piece of fly-paper--a sorrow alights and sticks there. But that isn't my nature. It doesn't take much to make me contented."
The weather remained pleasant, and the travelers were within a day's ride of Dura, when Witherspoon complained one morning of feeling ill, and by noon be could scarcely sit in his saddle.
"Let us stop somewhere," DeGolyer urged.
"No," Witherspoon answered, "let us get to Dura as soon as we can. I've got a fever, haven't I?"
DeGolyer leaned over and placed his hand on Witherspoon's forehead. "Yes, you have."
"The truth is, I haven't felt altogether right since the first day after we started, but I thought it would wear off."
When they reached Dura, Witherspoon was delirious. Not a ship was in port, and DeGolyer took him to an inn and summoned such medical aid as the hamlet afforded. The physician naturally gave the case a threatening color, and it followed that he was right, for at the close of the fourth day the patient gave no promise of improvement. The innkeeper said that sometimes a month passed between the landing of ships at that point. The fifth day came. DeGolyer sat by the bedside of his friend, fanning him. The doctor had called and had just taken his leave.
"Give me some water, Hank."
"Ah, you are coming around all right, my boy," DeGolyer cried. He brought the water; and when the patient drank and shook his head as a signal to take away the cup, DeGolyer asked; "Don't you feel a good deal better?"
"No."
"But your mind is clear?"
"Yes."
"Shall I put another cold cloth on your head?"
"If you please."
And when DeGolyer had gently done this, Witherspoon said: "Sit down here, Hank."
"All right, my boy, here I am."
"Hank, I'm not going to get well."
"Oh, yes, you are, and don't you let any such nonsense enter your head."
"It's a good ways from nonsense, I tell you. I know what I'm talking about; I know just as well as can be that I'm going to die--now you wait till I get through. It can't be helped, and there's no use in taking on over it. I did want to see my father and mother and sister, but it can't be helped."
DeGolyer was on his knees beside the bed. He attempted to speak, but his utterance was choked; and the tears in his eyes blurred to spectral dimness the only human being whom