White Bluffs spokesman. [volume] (White Bluffs, Wash.) 1907-1938, 1926-06-18
Continued from Last Week.


Three days after Jim Hood started
it, every man in Stovelid was in bed
and the great Stovelid typhoid siege
was on. Did say every man? There
were two exceptions Old Shad Pop
ley continued as we'll as ever. Shad
seldom drank water; besides, his in
ternal mechanism had becoa.e so &C.
customed to sinister things that a
typhoid germ stood absolutely no
show at all. Nor did Sam Duck fall
sick. Perhaps the red devil papers he
scattered all over the hotel made him
immune. l don't know,
The beginning of the epidemic is
more or less dim in my recollection
However, | recall two lucid intervals
that occurred before my light went
out for keeps. During the first lucid
big dining room where she had us all
bedded down as though we were in a
hospital ward, with old Shad Popley
ambling about, attending upon us and
sworn to approximate sobriety under
threats of horrible death.
you can't drive 'em, Miss Birdie!
heard Power Terribone insisting in
a weak, peevish voice. "You got to
talk mul talk to 'em-and you don't
know how They'll just noturally lay
down on you If you don't use mule
talk. And you don't speak thei1
language!"
He'd, Shad Popley-you hurry out
there and help me hitch up those
mules!" was BRIDES only response
Move fast, too. I'll have the Chucka
wal,a doctor here before tomorrow
night-there'll be dead mules scat
tered all over this DESERT! Fly!"
1T can't be done, Miss Birdie! ii
can't be done!" walled old Poker. at
takes two whole days to make thai
round trip-with a regular mule skin
ner drivin'-"
But Birdie was gone
came out for the second lucid in
terval to hear the jingle of harness
rings, the cracking of whip and {
stream of the most blood -curdlins
language | ever heard. Under tina
soaring attack the mules APPARENT,
broke into frightened gallop; ant
presently the sounds died away ant
| disappeared down the Chuckawall;
stage road.
"He, he, he!" chuckled poor ole
Poker Terribone weakly. "Birdi'
shore does speak their language afte
ALI"
1t was many days later when | mex
struggled back to consciousness.
opened my eyes and found mysel
peering up into the face Of yount
man; he could not have been NOR,
than twenty-five or thirty, with fuz
! on his chin and mustache which re
minded me of discouraged bunch o
alfilaria gross trying to grow on tn,
stingy desert soil. With the instinc
Of an cd desert dweller | guessed tina
he was tenderfoot-and not over /;
year out of college. He had a spool
in his hand.
Drink this!" he said.
l cordially invited him to go to a
climate even hotter than Stovelid's
famous ozone, uttering the words will
the superhuman effort with which al
exhausted sleeper strives to throw of
nightmare.
Drink it, l tell you'll" he repeated
advancing the spoon. l tried to ware
off the threatening invasion from m,
lips, but discovered that l hadn't thu
strength to move my hand. II WON'T
l muttered peevishly "Who are you?
I'm the DOCTOR" said the tender
foot. And If you don't open you
homely face and swallow this dope
you laundering old lizard, Pm goint
to punch you in the eye!"
Some way or another the idea O
this soft-handed tenderfoot threaten
ing to punch me in the eye struck me
as the funniest thing had ever heard
l giggled, the puerile giggle of two
UNDERGROUND man who has been re
duced to mere scrap of himself. The
doctor had half turned and grinned
over his shoulder.
This old fuzzy-face is coming along
Miss Birdine," he called. Hes got
his sense of humor back. He'll live!'
Dimly then | saw the face of Birdie
Calamus looking over the doctors
shoulder. But what a changed face!
1t was haggard and drawn by the long
weeks of battling with death. Night
and day, most of the time; so | was
told later. And not once in all that
time had she relaxed her persistent