"I like to sit here with you."
"Do you feel anything
strange?" he asked her.
"No. Just a little sleepy."
"I do," he said.
He had just felt death come by
again.
"You know the only thing I've
never lost is curiosity," he said
to her.
"You've never lost anything.
You're the most complete man
I've ever known."
"Christ," he said. "How little a
woman knows. What is that?
Your intuition?"
Because, just then, death had
come and rested its head on the
foot of the cot and he could
smell its breath.
"Never believe any of that
about a scythe and a skull," he
told her. "It can be two bicycle
policemen as easily, or be a
bird. Or it can have a wide
snout like a hyena."
It had moved up on him now,
but it had no shape any more. It
simply occupied space.
"Tell it to go away."
It did not go away but moved a
little closer.
"You've got a hell of a breath,"
he told it. "You stinking
bastard."
It moved up closer to him still
and now he could not speak to
it, and when it saw he could
not speak it came a little closer,
and now he tried to send it
away without speaking, but it
moved in on him so its weight
was all upon his chest, and
while it crouched there and he
could not move or speak, he
heard the woman say, "Bwana
is asleep now. Take the cot up
very gently and carry it into the
tent."
He could not speak to tell her
to make it go away and it
crouched now, heavier, so he
could not breathe. And then,
while they lifted the cot,
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