“I feel much better than yesterday. I did not tell you, but I have felt ill for nearly a week.”
“’Fraid to tell, eh?–and you were so scared over the beasts– Scared! By Jiminy, you’ve got grit, little woman! There’s two kinds of scaredness; you’ve got the Stonewall Jackson kind. If anybody asks you, just refer them to Tommy Blake.”
“Thank you, Mr. Blake. But should we not hasten back now to prepare something for Mr. Winthrope?”
“Ditto for yours truly. I’m like that sepulchre you read about–white outside, and within nothing but bare bones and emptiness.”
CHAPTER XV
WITH BOW AND CLUB
The fire was soon re-lit, and a pot of meat set on to stew. It had ample time to simmer. Winthrope was wrapped in a life-giving sleep, out of which he did not waken until evening, while Blake, unable to wait for the pot to boil, and nauseated by the fishy odor of the dried seafowl, hunted out the jerked leopard meat, and having devoured enough to satisfy a native, fell asleep under a bush.
The sun was half down the sky when he sat up and looked around, wide awake the moment he opened his eyes. Miss Leslie was quietly placing an armful of sticks on the fuel heap beside the baobab.
“Hello, Miss Jenny! Hard at it, I see,” he called cheerfully.
“Hush!” she cautioned. “Mr. Winthrope is still asleep.”