Opening the cabin door they crept to the bunk and stood looking at the sleeping man, who, aroused perhaps by the magnetic influence of four eyes upon him, started and stared up at them from his pillow.
Captain Duff drew back a step, scared a little by the wild gaze that Holdsworth fixed upon him, and which was made in some measure repellent by his gaunt and wasted face, and by the pitiable expression of bewilderment that passed slowly into it, and made it almost as meaningless as an idiot’s.
“How do you feel, my poor fellow?” asked Mr. Sherman; “stronger, I hope?”
Holdsworth made no answer, but knitted his brow with an air of profound perplexity, gazed slowly round him, then attentively at Mr. Sherman, then at the skipper, then at himself, finally pressing his hand to his head.
“How do you know he is English? Perhaps he don’t understand you,” said Captain Duff.
“I heard him mutter in English before I joined you last night,” answered Mr. Sherman.
“Pray tell me where I am?” said Holdsworth, in a faint voice.
“That’s English!” exclaimed the captain, though he looked as if he must take a thought of it yet, before he should allow himself to feel sure.
“You are among friends,” replied Mr. Sherman softly, and in a voice full of sympathy; “on board a vessel called the ‘Jessie Maxwell,’ bound to Australia. We sighted your boat yesterday morning.”
“My boat!” whispered Holdsworth, with an expression on his face of such deep bewilderment that it was painful to behold it.