The Forest Indians were small in stature, as I have observed in the proper place. But this man was six feet in height. He was as brown as I; and yet he wore clothes--clothes which were all in rags and tatters, and a pair of boots, split open at the toe-caps and bound with string about his ankles. Moreover, he carried in his hand a rifle; and this rifle he used as a staff, placing the butt upon the ground and leaning with his whole weight upon it as he limped slowly and painfully upon his way down the ravine immediately beneath me.
I have said that I had the instincts of a wild man. I was cautious, shy and cunning. I had learned to trust no one, to be suspicious of every one. And so I lay and watched him.
It occurred to me, by degrees, that I had seen him before. I could not for the life of me remember where. Then he sat down, with his face toward me.
He had a rough, weather-beaten, and yet a kindly, face. He had steel-grey eyes, and a rough, tangled beard. He was so close to me that I could see that his bare arms were tattooed; and it was this, perhaps, that gave me the clue I wanted. I looked at his beard again, and, unkempt as it was, it reminded me somehow of the beard of a Russian Czar. This man was William Rushby.
I was not sure of it at first. He was greatly changed from the honest sailor who had befriended me on board the Mary Greenfield. But when my mind was made up, and I was well-nigh carried away by mingled feelings of astonishment and gladness, I got to my feet and went towards him with my blow-pipe in my hand.
Without any ado, he whipped the butt of his rifle into the hollow of his shoulder, and I saw the sights were directed straight upon my heart.
"Hands up!" he cried to me in English. "Hands up, you brown barbarian, or else I shoot you dead!"
"'HANDS UP!' HE CRIED. 'HANDS UP, YOU BROWN BARBARIAN, OR ELSE I SHOOT YOU DEAD!'"
I grasped the truth in an instant; and it is well I did, for I have little doubt that he would have shot me where I stood. If William Rushby had changed in personal appearance since last we met, of a certainty I myself had changed still more. He took me for a wild man of the woods, though he yelled at me in English, and would have killed me out of hand, had I not lifted my arms and answered him, and laughed.