Zeppa rose at once and went away. While he was gone the fear of being murdered again took possession of Rosco. He felt that his last hour was approaching, and, in order to avoid his doom if possible, crawled away among the bushes and tried to hide himself. He was terribly weak, however, and had not got fifty yards away when he fell down utterly exhausted.
He heard Zeppa return to the cave, and listened with beating heart.
“Hallo! where are you?” cried the madman.
Then, receiving no answer, he burst into a long, loud fit of laughter, which seemed to freeze the very marrow in the pirate’s bones.
“Ha! ha!” he shouted, again and again, “I knew you were a dream, I felt sure of it—ha! ha! and now this proves it. And I’m glad you were a dream, for I did not want to kill you, Rosco, though I thought it my duty to do so. It was a dream—thank God, it was all a dream!”
Zeppa did not end again with wild laughter, but betook himself to earnest importunate prayer, during which Rosco crept, by slow degrees, farther and farther away, until he could no longer hear the sound of his enemy’s voice.
Now, it was while this latter scene had been enacting, that Orlando and the faithful negro set out on their search into the mountain.
At first they did not speak, and Ebony, not feeling sure how his young master relished his company, kept discreetly a pace or two in rear. After they had crossed the plain, however, and begun to scale the steep sides of the hills, his tendency towards conversation could not be restrained.
“Does you t’ink, Massa Orley, that hims be you fadder?”
“I think so, Ebony, indeed I feel almost sure of it.”