"He is ill--ill," she said.
I ran forward and caught him as he was falling. Ill?
Of course he was ill. What a fool I had been! Five minutes with him
assured me that he had fever. I had set his haggard appearance down to
some mental trouble--and I was going to be a professor in a medical
college!
Yet I know now that a troubled mind hastened the fever.
CHAPTER X
BETWEEN DAY AND DARK
From the beginning Galt Roscoe's fever was violent. It had been hanging
about him for a long time, and was the result of malarial poisoning. I
devoutly wished that we were in the Mediterranean instead of the Red Sea,
where the heat was so great; but fortunately we should soon be there.
There was no other case of sickness on board, and I could devote plenty
of time to him. Offers of assistance in nursing were numerous, but I only
encouraged those of the bookmaker, strange as this may seem; yet he was
as gentle and considerate as a woman in the sick-room. This was on the
first evening of his attack. After that I had reasons for dispensing with
his generous services. The night after Roscoe was taken ill we were
passing through the canal, the search-light of the 'Fulvia' sweeping the
path ahead of it and glorifying everything it touched.
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