“Hallo, old cockbird! How are you?”
Gracious me, you should only have seen him jump!
Chapter Twenty Four.
At Home Again.
Sam Pengelly started up, and looked at me as if he thought I was a ghost.
“What, laddie, is it you really?” he exclaimed, peering into my face with his own, which, usually as florid as a peony, was now all white with emotion; while his lips trembled nervously as he spoke. “Why,” he said, after a close inspection to see whether I was actually Martin Leigh or else some base impostor assuming his voice and guise, “it is the young cockbird, by all that’s living—ain’t I glad!” And, then, throwing his arms round me in a bear-like hug, he almost squeezed every particle of breath out of my body.
“Now, come along,” he said presently, when he could speak again, the kind-hearted fellow’s joy choking him at first, and preventing him from uttering a syllable; though he sighed, and drew his breath again in a long sigh like a sob, and finally cleared his throat with a cough that might have been heard on Drake Island.
“Where?” I asked.