The man drank gratefully.
"And I marvel," added Turnpenny, "that 'ee be still alive in this fearsome place of wild beasts. Verily the Almighty has kept a guard over you, even as He defended Daniel in the den of lions."
"'Tis true; yet I did what I could for myself. Come and see."
He led them through the forest, winding in and out among the trees in a manner that seemed to the others nothing short of marvellous, until he came to a great trunk in which there were notches cut, from a point near the base to the lowest branch. By these notches he climbed up, Dennis and Turnpenny following in turn. The steps ceased when the bough was reached; then he ascended some twenty feet through foliage until he arrived at a little hut, formed of branches cunningly intertwined, with a roofing of thatch.
"My heart, 'tis a pleasant and delectable mansion!" said Turnpenny, looking admiringly at the leafy structure. "And did 'ee fashion it with your own hands, Tom?"
"No," replied the man, with a smile. "Here I found it, as it is. It was made, I doubt not, by Indians, in the time before the Spaniards set foot on these shores. 'Twas here I lay when the fever was heavy upon me, and I thought to die. Oh! how good it is to see your face, Haymoss; but what brings 'ee, old friend, to this dreadful place, and how got you free from the hands of the oppressor?"
"'Twas the deed of this gentleman, a man of Devon, Tom, that was cast on an island yonder in the Main, and by wit and courage loosed me from bondage."
He told the whole story, to the great wonderment of his friend.
"And now we be here to help Ned Whiddon and Hugh Curder and others of our messmates in the fort," he said, in conclusion. "By God's mercy we will snatch them, too, from the house of bondage, and make them free men once more."
"Ay, and I will help. The sight of 'ee has done me a world of good; the Lord has put a new song in my mouth. I will lead you. I know this forest in and out, Haymoss, for though I be by rights but a simple mariner, I am made now into a woodsman. For why? 'Cos otherwise I should have been a dead man. The spear I threw but now,—God be praised it failed of its mark, sir! and I bethink me 'tis still sticking in the tree—has served me in good stead many a time and oft. 'Twas the only thing I brought away with me, and without it long ere this the birds would ha' picked my bones."