"How cold I am," said Tobias.
"Cold, Tobias!" said Ingestrie. "My good fellow, we will have a fire if you are cold."
"Oh, no—no. Not on my account, Mr. Ingestrie, I shall be better soon; but I feel as if something were going to happen. My heart beats so fearfully, and at the same time, I shake as if—as if—I know not what."
"Give him a glass of wine," said Ingestrie to Johanna.
Tobias took the glass of wine, and it evidently did him some good; but yet he looked ill and uneasy. Orders were given that the shipwrecked man should be shown up to the drawing-room, for they were all curious to know to what ship he had belonged, and how many had fallen victims to the frightful gale that had made the vessel such a complete wreck.
"He is coming, poor fellow," said the colonel. "I hear his footsteps on the stairs. He comes slowly. No doubt he is weak yet."
"Poor fellow!" sighed Johanna. "Have the wine ready to give him at once, mother. It will put some heart into him. What must be his feelings towards you, Mark?"
"Come now," said Ingestrie; "don't plague him, any of you, about his being saved by me, and all that sort of thing. Just say nothing about it. Sailors are no great orators, at the best of times, and if he begins to make a speech about his gratitude, you may depend he will never get to the end of it."
"Yes; but he ought to know," said Mrs. Oakley, "who he owes his life to, under providence."
"Hem!" said Ben. He never liked to hear Mrs. Oakley begin to use religious phrases, as they had a tendency to remind him of the late Mr. Lupin.