But waiting here was certainly lonesome.
He began to think of home, and before many minutes he was in dreamland. And the spirit of his dreams flew away with him far over the sea, far over the wild mountain lands of Ecuador, across Colombia, and across the wide Atlantic to the dear old farm of Craigielea; and he found himself, as he thought, walking towards the house from the pine-wood, with little laughing ’Theena by his side. ’Theena was not a whit bigger, nor did she seem a day older, than when he had left her. Nor was his mother, father, and uncle at all astonished to see him, but simply made room for him at the fireside, as in the days of yore; and he sat as of old at his sister’s feet, with her loving fingers entwined in his hair.
How long he had slept he could not tell. He awoke with a start at last; for the cat had sprung on his shoulder, and was growling low and ominously. The moon was very high now, and suddenly escaping from a cloud shone full on the figure of a man, or—was it a spectre?
An unaccountable feeling of superstitious dread seized him, and he trembled in every limb. The figure was tall, and as well as could be made out dressed in skins, but with naked brown arms and feet. The face was almost black, and a short dark beard curled round cheeks and chin.
Next instant he or it had glided silently behind a tree.
Tom forced a laugh to relieve his mind.
“I have been dreaming,” he said aloud.
But surely there must have been something there, else why had the cat growled?
For the first time in his life, as far as he could remember, he experienced something akin to genuine fear as he set out to walk homewards through the woods.
The clouds were very high to-night, which gave the moon the appearance of being exceedingly far away. The whole sky, partially overcast with these soft-looking feathery clouds, had little rifts of deep dark blue between, and it was only when the moon escaped into one of these that everything could be seen distinctly.