“Please go ’way and let me sleep,
I would rather sleep than eat!”
--_The Sluggard._
“He’s coming round. That man’s suhtenly got a cast-iron skull. Such a
blow with a .45 would ’a’ killed most fellers. What you goin’ to do
with him, Judge?”
“I don’t know. It strikes me that he would be a valuable man for us.
That was the nerviest performance I ever saw. Had I been told that any
one could mix it that way with Oily Broderick and two guns, and get off
with it scot-free except for this little love tap, I should never have
believed it.” The voice was rich, clear, slow, well-modulated. “Perhaps
he may be induced to join us. If not----”
The words reached Jeff from immeasurable distances. He was floating
on a particularly soft and billowy cloud at the time: a cloud with
a buoyant and undulant motion, very soothing. Jeff noted it with
approval. Underneath and a little ahead, a high and exceedingly
steep mountain rose abruptly from the sea. It was built entirely of
piled, roundish boulders. The contour seemed familiar. Madagascar, of
course! How clever of him to remember! Jeff turned the cloud. It sank
in slow and graceful spirals to the peak. Doubtless the voices came
from there. The words seemed to have an unexplained connection with
some circumstance that he could not quite recall. He felt the elusive
memory slipping away. However, it made no difference. He drifted into a
delicious vagueness.
Something hard was forced between his teeth; a fiery liquid trickled
down his throat. He gasped and struggled; his eyes fluttered open. To
his intense disappointment the cloud was gone. An arm was propping him
up. Mysterious blankets appeared before him from somewhere or other. On
them lay an arm and a bandaged hand. The hand was hurting some one very
much. Jeff wondered whose it was. He looked at the hand fixedly for a
long time and, on further examination, found it to be his own. Here was
a pretty state of affairs!
A pillow was thrust behind him and the supporting arm withdrawn. At
once he felt a throbbing pain in his head. He put his hand up and lo!
his head was also heavily bandaged! He regretted Madagascar more than
ever. He settled back for reflection. Looking up, after a little, he
saw a chair with the back turned toward him; astride the chair, a
middle-aged man, large, clean-shaven, rosy, well-dressed, and, as it
seemed to Jeff, unnecessarily cheerful. His eyes twinkled; his hands,
which were white and plump and well kept, played a little ditty on the
chair-back. There was a ruby on one finger. Beyond him sat a gross, fat
man with a stubbly beard, a coarse, flat nose and little, piggish, red
eyes. His legs were crossed and he smoked a villainous pipe. There were
other men behind these two. Jeff was just turning to look at them when
his attention was recalled by a voice from the man astride the chair.
“And how are we now, my young friend? A trifle dazed, I fancy?
Something of a headache?” He showed his white teeth in a friendly
smile; his voice was soft and playful. “Are we well enough to eat
something? What with our recent disagreeable shock and our long
abstinence from food, we must find ourself rather feeble.”
Jeff stared at the man while he digested this communication. “A little
coffee,” he said at last. “I can’t eat anything now. I am dizzy and
most everlasting sick at my stomach. Put out that damned pipe!”
The soft-voiced man chuckled delightedly, as if he found this
peremptory command exquisitely humorous. “You hear, Borrowman?
Evidently Mr. Bransford is of those who want what they want when they
want it. Bring a little soup, too. He’ll feel better after he drinks
his coffee.”
The man addressed as Borrowman disappeared with a shuffling gait.
Jeff lay back and considered. His half-shut eyes wandered around.
Whitewashed stone walls, a heavily-ironed door, no window--that was
queer, too!--floor and ceiling of rough boards, a small fireplace,
two chairs, a pine table, a lighted lamp. That was all. His gaze
came back to the man in the chair, to find that gentleman’s large
blue eyes watching him with a quizzical and humorous look--a look
highly suggestive of a cat enjoying a little casual entertainment
with a mouse. In his weakened condition Jeff found this feline regard
disconcerting.
The coffee came, and the soup. After Jeff’s refreshment the man in the
chair rose. “We will leave you to the care of our good Borrowman,”
he said, baring his white, even teeth. “I will be back this evening
and, if you are stronger, we will then discuss some rather momentous
affairs. Go to sleep now.”
The caressing advice seemed good. Jeff was just dropping off when a
disturbing thought intruded itself.
This evening? Then it must be day now. Why did they burn a lamp in
daytime? The problem was too much for Jeff. Still pondering it, he
dozed off.
When he woke the lamp was yet burning; the objectionable fat man sat
by the fire. When he turned his head, presently, Jeff was startled to
observe that this man had got hold of an entirely new set of features.
Here was an extraordinary thing! Hard features, and unprepossessing
still, but clean at least. How very curious!
After a while a simple solution presented itself. It was not the same
man at all! Jeff wondered why he had not hit upon that at first.
It seemed that he had now become a body entirely surrounded by fat
men--no--that wasn’t right. “Let me--let me name the Supreme Court
of a nation and I care not who makes the laws.” No, that was John
Wesley Pringle’s gag. Good old Wes’! Wonder where he is? He wasn’t
fat. How did that go? Oh, yes! “Let me have men about me that are
fat!”--Something snapped--and Jeff remembered.
Not all at once. He lay silent, with closed eyes, and pieced together
scraps of recollection, here and there, bit by bit. It was like a
picture puzzle; so much so that Jeff quite identified each random
memory with some definite shape, eagerly fitting them together in a
frame; and, when he had adjusted them satisfactorily to a perfect
square, fell peacefully asleep.