Stanley, too, came up to the opening.
“Looks like preparations for a battle,” he said.
“And it is all for our benefit, no doubt. I wonder what Quizquiz intends to do?”
“We shall find out soon enough. I wonder where he is?”
They tried to venture out of their tent, but the guards pounced upon them immediately and forced them back into the prison.
Days passed slowly for the two confined within the narrow space of their shelter; but, fortunately, they were not again bound. Evidently their captor had no fear that they might escape—the place was too well guarded. The suspense was terrible. They knew only too well that all the preparations going on around them were directly connected with their fate; but what that fate was to be they could not even surmise.
One day Ted noticed that Stanley was counting a number of knots that he had tied in a string. “Poor fellow,” he thought as he watched him sadly, “his mind is going, but I cannot blame him. It’s enough to drive any one mad. Sometimes I think I feel myself slipping, too”; the latter was uttered half aloud.
“What are you mumbling about?” Stanley asked, looking up. “I guess I know; it is enough to drive anybody crazy.”
“I was just thinking the same thing about you when I saw you playing with that string. What are you doing?”
“What, this? Take a good look and see if you can’t guess.”