"No, I tell you that I'm going to die; and you won't do me the only
favor I could ask. Don't you remember saying, not long ago, that a
man's life is a pretense almost from the beginning to the end?"

"I don't remember saying it, but it agrees with what I have often been
compelled to think."

"Well, then, if you think that life is a pretense, why not pretend by
request?"

"Well talk about it some other time, my boy."

"But there may not be any other time."

"Oh, yes, there will be. Don't you think you can sleep now?"

"No, I don't think I can sleep and wake up again."

But he did sleep, and he did awake again. Three more days passed
wearily away, and the patient was delirious most of the time.
DeGolyer's acquaintance with Spanish was but small, and he could
comprehend but little of what a pedantic doctor might say, yet he
learned that there was not much encouragement to be drawn from the
fact that the sick man's mind sometimes returned from its troubled
wandering.

DeGolyer was again alone with his friend. It was a hot though a
blustery afternoon, and the sea, in sight through the open door,
sounded the deeper notes of its endless opera.