Jack, the Somali, was equal to the occasion.
He went away to the forest, and was not long in finding a site for the invalid’s camp.
Like that upon Mount Andrew, it was on a hill or eminence, from which the country eastwards could be seen for many, many miles. And here also was a shelter under a rock from the direct rays of the sun.
Next day, and for several days, poor Harry tossed about on his couch in a raging fever.
But Jack proved an excellent surgeon, and Raggy the best of nurses. The former applied cooling and healing antiseptic leaves to Harry’s wounds, and bound them tenderly up with bundles of grass, while the latter hardly ever left his master’s couch, except to seek for and bring him the most luscious fruit the forest could afford.
Long, long weary weeks passed away, but still Harry lay there in his cave on the hillside too weak to stand, too ill to move.
Between them his two faithful servants had built him a hut of branches and grass, which not only defended him against the sun, but against the rain as well—for the wet season had now set in. Thunders rolled over the plains and reverberated from the mountain sides, and at times the rain came down in terrible “spatters” that in volume far exceeded anything Harry could ever have dreamt of.
But the rain cooled and purified the atmosphere, and seemed to so revive Harry, that his wounds took on what surgeons call the healing intention.
Raggy was a joyful boy then, and honest Jack, the Somali—for he had proved himself honest by this time—was doubly assiduous in his endeavours to perfect a cure.
One afternoon, while Jack was talking to his master, Raggy, who had been in the forest, ran in breathless and scared.