"Yes, it's me, Jim," came the answer. "I knew you would come."
CHAPTER XVI The Prisoners by the Mount
Silently the two men clasped hands. Mackay could not trust himself to speak, so strong was his emotion at meeting his old leader in the flesh after having given him up as dead for over a year.
"Yes, I knew you would come, Jim," repeated Richard Bentley, the explorer, "and month after month I have watched for you on the mountain-top, hoping yet fearing for your coming."
"But the bones?" murmured Mackay, questioningly. "I—saw—the bones?"
Bentley smiled. "I wouldn't have thought it of you, Jim," he said, his eyes twinkling with amusement. "But I see you must have fallen into the error you used to preach so much against. Where were your powers of observation? I am sure you would have known the difference between camels' bones and human bones if you had examined them. But I know how you must have felt, old man, and I don't wonder at your mistake at such a terrible moment. They burnt the camels, Jim, because they could never take them through the passage in the mountain——"
"Whaur is ma auld enemy?" roared an interrupting voice, and a lithe figure in savage habiliments spun into the midst of the group, blowing tempestuously. The impetus of his flight down the steep hillside was only brought to a close when he bounced against Mackay like a weighty stone from a catapult.
"I kent it was you! I kent it was you!" he cried, in honest delight; "I couldna mistak' that sweet visage o' yours even though it's half changed its colour."