“Oh, don’t look at me so reproachfully, my child,” sighed the Doctor to himself, as the weary boy’s eyes looked large and dark in the shade; but only for a few moments before they grew dull, and then the lids fell and he was sleeping so soundly that he did not stir when the Doctor raked the soft sweet-scented pine needles round him till he lay as if it were in a nest.
And only a few minutes after the Doctor had sunk lower and lower, drooping over his charge to keep watch, but only to leave that to the great bright stars which came out one by one, peering down among the pine boughs at the dark spot where the travellers, old and young, were sleeping soundly.
Chapter Three.
Phil was the first to wake in the soft grey morning, to lie listening to a regular sharp tapping made by a busy woodpecker somewhere among the ancient pines; and he wondered some time what it meant and where he was. But a soft deep breath close to his ear made him start round so suddenly that he awoke Dr Martin, who started up looking as surprised as his bed-fellow.
“I couldn’t recollect where I was,” said Phil, “Oh, I am so hungry.”
“And no wonder, my poor boy. There, come and bathe your face with me, and at all costs we must get to some farmhouse and buy or beg our breakfast.”
The bathing was soon at an end, and though disposed to limp a little, Phil stepped out bravely in the direction the Doctor chose, and with such good effect that before long the chimneys of a farmhouse were seen, for which they made at once.
“Cows,” said Phil, eagerly, “and a man milking.”