"How long have I been here?"
"Three days. I was afraid it was goin' to be typhoid, but it was jes' a nervous fever from starvation and so much exposure. It was mighty high, though, for a while. T'other boy tole me how you-all's been lost and a-wanderin' in the swamp. You boys sure has seen sights."
"Are we out of the swamp at last?" asked Ted eagerly.
"Not by a long jump. You're on Blackjack, one o' the biggest islands." Noting the boy's sigh of disappointment, the old man added: "But don't worry. You lay quiet till to-morrow, and then I'll tell you more about it, and show you the way out o' the swamp."
"Oh, thank you. You are very kind."
With such a prospect in view, it would be easy to lie quiet until the morrow, it being now late in the afternoon. Ted wanted to ask many questions, but he submitted when his host bade him be quiet and withdrew. A few minutes later Hubert entered, with a smile on his face, and the boys congratulated each other.
"I think we are safe at last," said Ted, relaxing on his bed and beginning really to rest.
"Yes, I think we are," said Hubert. "That Mr. George Smith is very kind, though he is a queer old duck. He looks just like a ram-goat with that long beard running down into a point. He's been camping and trapping here for years. I was afraid to tell him that we had been kept prisoners on Deserters' Island. I haven't said a thing about the slackers."
"Perhaps that was just as well," said Ted, dreamily, and soon fell asleep.
An hour or more later his eyes filled with tears of gratitude as his elderly host brought in a delicious quail stew for his supper.