Hulloa, there! [DICK _starts up and seizes the gun. The_ DOCTOR _laughs_.] All right. Don't shoot. It's only me. DICK. [_With a laugh._] Why the dickens did you wake me up? I was dreaming--dreaming of a high-heeled boot and a neat ankle, and the swish of a white lace petticoat. DOCTOR. I thought I'd just have a look at your arm. DICK. It's one of the most æsthetic sights I know. DOCTOR. Your arm? DICK. A pretty woman crossing Piccadilly at Swan and Edgar's. You are a savage, my good doctor, and a barbarian. You don't know the care and forethought, the hours of anxious meditation, it has needed for her to hold up that well-made skirt with the elegant grace which enchants you. DOCTOR. I'm afraid you're a very immoral man, Lomas. DICK. Ah, my dear fellow, at my time of life I have to content myself with condemning the behaviour of the younger generation. Even a camp bed in a stuffy tent with mosquitoes buzzing all around me has allurements greater than those of youth and beauty. And I declare for all women to hear that I am proof against their wiles. Give me a comfortable bed to sleep in, plenty to eat, tobacco to smoke, and Amaryllis may go hang. DOCTOR. Well, let's look at this wound of yours. Has it been throbbing at all? DICK. Oh, it's not worth bothering about. It'll be all right to-morrow. DOCTOR. I'll put a clean dressing on all the same. DICK. All right. [_He takes off his coat and rolls up his sleeve. His arm is bandaged, and during the next speeches the_ DOCTOR _puts on a dressing and a clean bandage_.] You must be pretty well done up, aren't you? DOCTOR. Just about dropping. But I've got a deuce of a lot more work before I turn in. DICK. The thing that amuses me is to remember that I came to Africa thinking I was going to have a rattling good time. DOCTOR. You couldn't exactly describe it as a picnic, could you? But I don't suppose any of us knew it would be such a tough job as it's turned out. DICK. My friend, if ever I return to my native land, I will never be such a crass and blithering idiot as to give way again to a spirit of adventure. DOCTOR. [_With a laugh._] You're not the sort of chap whom one would expect to take to African work. Why the blazes did you come? DICK. That's precisely what I've been asking myself ever since we landed in this God-forsaken swamp. DOCTOR. The wound looks healthy enough. It'll hardly even leave a scar. DICK. I'm glad that my fatal beauty won't be injured.... You see, Alec's about the oldest friend I have. And then there's young Allerton, I've known him ever since he was a kid. DOCTOR. That's an acquaintance that most of us wouldn't boast about. DICK. I had an idea I'd like Bond Street all the better when I got back. I never knew that I should be eaten alive by every kind of disgusting animal by night and day. I say, Doctor, do you ever think of a rump steak? DOCTOR. When? DICK.