'Ye'll have a Disthrict Coort-martial settin' on ye yet, me son,' said
Mulvaney, 'but'--he opened a bottle--'I will not report ye this time.
Fwhat's in the mess-kid is mint for the belly, as they say, 'specially
whin that mate is dhrink. Here's luck! A bloody war or a--no, we've
got the sickly season. War, thin!'--he waved the innocent 'pop' to the
four quarters of Heaven. 'Bloody war! North, East, South, an' West!
Jock, ye quakin' hayrick, come an' dhrink.'

But Learoyd, half mad with the fear of death presaged in the swelling
veins in his neck, was begging his Maker to strike him dead, and
fighting for more air between his prayers. A second time Ortheris
drenched the quivering body with water, and the giant revived.

'An' Ah divn't see thot a mon is i' fettle for gooin' on to live; an'
Ah divn't see thot there is owt for t' livin' for. Hear now, lads!
Ah'm tired--tired. There's nobbut watter i' ma bones. Let me die!'

The hollow of the arch gave back Learoyd's broken whisper in a bass
boom. Mulvaney looked at me hopelessly, but I remembered how the madness
of despair had once fallen upon Ortheris, that weary, weary afternoon
on the banks of the Khemi River, and how it had been exorcised by the
skilful magician Mulvaney.

'Talk, Terence!' I said, 'or we shall have Learoyd slinging loose, and
he'll be worse than Ortheris was. Talk! He'll answer to your voice.'

Almost before Ortheris had deftly thrown all the rifles of the Guard
on Mulvaney's bedstead, the Irishman's voice was uplifted as that of
one in the middle of a story, and, turning to me, he said--