there–there wasn’t time–made them on the platform. And breaking for
the platform, Thompson got suffocated and fell; and before I got him
dragged out, which I did by the collar, I was mighty near gone myself.
When we revived, Thompson said dejectedly,–
“We got to stay out here, Cap. We got to do it. They ain’t no other
way. The Governor wants to travel alone, and he’s fixed so he can
outvote us.”
And presently he added,
“And don’t you know, we’re pisoned. It’s our last trip, you can make up
your mind to it. Typhoid fever is what’s going to come of this. I feel
it acoming right now. Yes, sir, we’re elected, just as sure as you’re
born.”
We were taken from the platform an hour later, frozen and insensible, at
the next station, and I went straight off into a virulent fever, and
never knew anything again for three weeks. I found out, then, that I had
spent that awful night with a harmless box of rifles and a lot of
innocent cheese; but the news was too late to save me; imagination had
done its work, and my health was permanently shattered; neither Bermuda
nor any other land can ever bring it back tome. This is my last trip; I
am on my way home to die.