"Is it serious?"

"In this world everything is serious--and nothing."

"Will I die?"

Schulze slowly surveyed all Hiram's outward signs of majesty that had
been denied his own majestic intellect, noted the tremendous figure, the
shoulders, the forehead, the massive brow and nose and chin--an
_ensemble_ of unabused power, the handiwork of Nature at her best, a
creation worth while, worth preserving intact and immortal.

"Yes," he answered, with satiric bitterness; "you will have to die, and
rot, just like the rest of us."

"Tell me!" Hiram commanded. "Will I die soon?"

Schulze reflected, rubbing his red-button nose with his stubby fingers.
When he spoke, his voice had a sad gentleness. "You can bear hearing it.
You have the right to know." He leaned back, paused, said in a low tone:
"Put your house in order, Mr. Ranger."

Hiram's steadfast gray eyes met bravely the eyes of the man who had just
read him his death warrant. A long pause; then Hiram said "Thank you," in
his quiet, calm way.

He took the prescriptions, went out into the street. It looked strange to
him; he felt like a stranger in that town where he had spent half a
century--felt like a temporary tenant of that vast, strong body of his