Beeber takes the blood-stained rag from his mouth
"I beg yer indulgence good sir. I have been many months in the mountains and the damn cold has seeped into my bones. I fear my throat is burned raw with ice and will never recover but the cough improves day by day."
He glances furtively from side to side. "Perhaps it is my fate that the ice will be my death but so long as I live long enough to achieve a measure of freedom I do not fear death."
He tapped his nose and smiled a grim smile "If you take my meaning?"
"But tell me Master innkeeper, why should you equate those three with death?"