In the repository on wyrm, revision 1.119 is identical in all versions from 7.0 onwards, and that snippet is the same as in your 7.0 repository.
I can only draw the conclusion that your las.c,v in 7.2 is corrupt. In that case one wonders where else similar corruption might have occurred.
How does the 1.119 revision look in the ,v file? It's like this on wyrm:
1.119 log @Fixed memory leak. @ text @d8 1 a8 1 RCSID("$Id: las.c,v 1.118 1999/11/20 03:41:15 grubba Exp $"); d2060 11 a2070 6 s=pop_type(); f=CAR(n)->type?CAR(n)->type:mixed_type_string; n->type=check_call(s,f); args=count_arguments(s); max_args=count_arguments(f); if(max_args<0) max_args=0x7fffffff; @