Through the opening, as the barrier was removed by a leather-skinned old crone, Carroll gazed into a passageway, beyond which stretched a foul mule yard, bordered by what the visitor at first supposed to be stalls, until he saw bedding and utensils in them.  The two men lifted the cripple in, amid the outcries and lamentations of the aged woman, who had looked at his face and then covered her own.  At once they were surrounded by a swarm of women and children, who pressed upon them, hampering their movements, until a shrill voice cried:—­

“La muerte negra!”

The swarm fell into silence, scattered, vanished, leaving only the moaning woman to help.  At her direction they settled the patient on a straw pallet in a side room.

“That’s all you can do,” said the Unspeakable Perk to his companion.  “And thank you.”

“I’ll stay.”

The goggles gloomed upon him in the dim room.

“I thought probably you would,” commented Perkins, and busied himself over the cripple with a knife and some cloths.  He had stuffed his ludicrous white gloves into his pocket, and was tearing strips from his handkerchief with skillful fingers.

“Oughtn’t he to have a doctor?” asked Carroll.  “Shall I go for one?”

“His mother has sent.  No use, though.”

“He can’t be saved?”

“Not a chance on earth.  I should say he was in the last stages.”

“What is it?” said Carroll hesitantly.

“La muerte negra.  The black death.”

“Plague?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sure?  Are you an expert?”

“One doesn’t have to be to recognize a case like that.  The lump in the armpit is as big as a pigeon’s egg.”

“Why have you interested yourself in the man to such an extent?” asked Carroll curiously.

“He’s a friend of mine.  Why did you?”

“Oh, that’s quite different.  One can’t disregard a call for help such as yours.”

“A certain kind of ‘one’ can’t,” returned the Unspeakable Perk, with his half-smile.  “You don’t mind my saying, Mr. Carroll, you’re a brave man.”

“And I’d have said that you weren’t,” replied the other bluntly.  “I give it up.  But I know this:  I’m going to be pretty wretchedly frightened until I know that I haven’t got it.  I’m frightened now.”

“Then you’re a braver man than I thought.  But the danger may be less than you think.  Stick to that cigar—­here are two more—­and wait for me outside.  Here’s the doctor.”

Profound and solemn under a silk hat, the local physician entered, bowing to Carroll as they passed in the hallway.  Almost immediately Perkins emerged.  On his face was a sardonic grin.

“Malaria,” he observed.  “The learned professor assures me that it’s a typical malaria.”

“Then it isn’t the plague,” said Carroll, relieved.

His relief was of brief duration.

“Of course it’s plague.  But if Professor Silk Hat, in there, officially declared it such, he’d have bracelets on his arms in twelve hours.  The present Government of Caracuia doesn’t believe in bubonic plague.  I fancy our unfortunate friend in there will presently disappear, either just before or just after death.  It doesn’t greatly matter.”