Sobrinini had worked herself into a frenzy of fury. She danced about Bomba in a hideous way, shaking her shriveled fists in the air and mouthing horribly.
Now she came close to the lad and pushed her wrinkled face in his. She raised an arm above her head as though to strike him. Bomba stood unflinching.
She paused suddenly, arrested apparently by something she saw in his face.
“Ah!” she cried. “Bring the torches nearer.”
The command rang out in a strikingly clear voice and instantly there was a stir among the natives. Evidently she was accustomed to being obeyed without question.
One great sullen fellow came forward and thrust his flaring torch almost in Bomba’s face.
Sobrinini peered closely at the lad for a moment, and then shrank back with a piercing scream.
“You!” she cried, again coming close and staring at him wildly. “How came you here? Are you a ghost, Bartow?”
Into Bomba’s heart came a swift feeling of amazement.
What was the meaning of this? Like an echo of the words came the memory of Jojasta’s cry as Bomba had bent above him when he was pinned beneath the fallen column. Jojasta had called him Bartow and thought he was a ghost.