“Perhaps he has some message for me. You know I made arrangements with him to bring any message of importance.”
The sailor drew up his horse as he approached.
“Ahoy there, mates!” he cried. “At last I have struck port, although I’d begun to wonder if I’d ever find it. This confounded old valley has moved since I was here last. I thought I knew just where it was, but I have spent two whole days cruising around in search of it.”
“Hello, cap’n!” said Frank. “You’re just in time for supper.”
“Supper!” exclaimed the sailor. “Say it again! Supper! Why, I have been living on condensed air for the last twenty-four hours. Look at me! I am so thin and emaciated that I can’t cast a shadow. Hungry! Mates, a bootleg stew would be a culinary luxury to me. I will introduce ravage and devastation among your provisions. This morning I found an empty tomato can and another that once contained deviled ham, and I lunched off them. They were rather hard to digest, but they were better than nothing.”
He sprang down from his horse, which betrayed evidence of hard usage.
“How did you happen to come?” asked Merry.
Wiley fumbled in his pocket and brought forth a telegram.
“I believe I made arrangements to deliver anything of importance directed to you,” he said. “This dispatch arrived in Prescott, and I lost no time in starting to fulfill my compact.”
Merry took the telegram and quickly tore it open. There was a look of anxiety on his face when he had read its contents.