“Why, I’ve seen him before,” he cried. “He’s the chap I met in Baltimore, or his twin brother. How can that be, though? Jack, what do you say? Who is he?”
“Artie Jenkins!” exclaimed Harvey. “I’d know him, no matter where he was. He’s the chap that trapped me—and of all places to find him! Say, you’re Artie Jenkins, aren’t you?”
He looked the youth in the eyes and shook him. The youth nodded, feebly.
“Yes,” he whispered.
“Well,” said Tom Edwards, lifting the tin again, “you get the coffee, just the same—but hang me if I ever thought I’d do that much for you. Hold him up, Jack. Here, drink this.”
Artie Jenkins, choking and breathing hard between his efforts, drank the tin-full of hot coffee, and they laid him down again. They rubbed his legs and arms till they were warmed with renewed vitality. Then they rolled him in the blankets and let him lie by the fire.
“He’s all right, I guess,” said Stanton, “but he had a close call. Another hour out there in the cold and he never would have waked up. It’s funny, though, that you know him; how did it happen?”
“Yes, he’s an old friend of ours,” said Tom Edwards, smiling; “we’re sort of old Johns Hopkins chums, he and Harvey and I. We went to school with him—on the Baltimore water front.” And he narrated the story of their acquaintance with Artie Jenkins. “Jack and I had a score to settle with him,” he said in conclusion; “but it looks to me as though someone had settled it for us. Judging by the looks of our friend, I guess he’s had enough, eh, Jack?”
Harvey nodded.
“I guess we’ll call it even,” he replied. “But what puzzles me is, what are we going to do with him?” Harvey looked at Mr. Stanton, inquiringly. The latter did not answer, but started suddenly toward the door.