He wrote, sprawling across
the desk, covering page upon page with giant hieroglyphics, lighting
cigarette after cigarette at the end of the last one, but with his
thoughts far away, and, as he performed the act, staring
uncomprehendingly at the captain's colored calendar pinned on the
wall before him. For many months later the Battle of Santiago was
associated in his mind with a calendar for the month of July,
illuminated by a colored picture of six white kittens in a basket.
At three o'clock Channing ceased writing and stood up, shivering and
shaking with a violent chill. He cursed himself for this weakness,
and called aloud for the captain.
"I can't stop now," he cried. He seized the rough fist of the captain
as a child clings to the hand of his nurse.
"Give me something," he begged. "Medicine, quinine, give me something
to keep my head straight until it's finished. Go, quick," he
commanded. His teeth were chattering, and his body jerked with sharp,
uncontrollable shudders. The captain ran, muttering, to his medicine-
chest.
"We've got one drunken man on board," he said to the mate, "and now
we've got a crazy one. You mark my words, he'll go off his head at
sunset.
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