He stopped abruptly; for the intense look of eager anxiety, doubt, and hope in the thin expressive face alarmed him.
“Charlie!” gasped, rather than said, the invalid, “you—you never spoke to me before in my dreams, and—you never touched—the grip of your strong h— O God! can it be true?”
At this point Buck Tom suddenly left off his occupation at the fire and went out of the cave.
Chapter Fifteen.
Lost and Found.
“Try to be calm, Shank,” said Charlie, in a soothing tone, as he kneeled beside the shadow that had once been his sturdy chum, and put an arm on his shoulder. “It is indeed myself this time. I have come all the way from England to seek you, for we heard, through Ritson, that you were ill and lost in these wilds, and now, through God’s mercy, I have found you.”
While Charlie Brooke was speaking, the poor invalid was breathing hard and gazing at him, as if to make quite sure it was all true.
“Yes,” he said at last, unable to raise his voice above a hoarse whisper, “lost—and—and—found! Charlie, my friend—my chum—my—”