Poutingly, she granted his request, and, patting the grass beside her, indicated an adjacent seat for the Indian. “How now, Roger?” said she. “Why so glum and owlish? Is ’t because your friend King Lud is absent?”
For a moment Prat surveyed her in silence, rolling his eyes, until at length, “Nay,” he replied, “I am well accustomed to his Majesty’s peregrinations. Oftentimes for a whole week he roves, and never a sight of him. ’Tis but three days now since he went a-nutting. Nay, nay, ’tis not o’ the bear I think—not o’ the bear.”
“Of what, then?”
But, giving no answer, he only blinked and blinked at the fire, so mournfully that many, noticing his look, long remembered it.
Vytal watched him silently.
“He hath even forgot,” observed Manteo, “to smoke his pipe of uppowac.”
The soldier made no response, but asked, finally: “Art sleepy, Manteo?”
“Nay, most wakeful.”
“I, too, am so; but sith for two nights no sleep hath come to me, ’tis essential that I rest. Do you keep watch, and, if aught occurs beyond the ordinary, arouse me instantly.” Whereupon, stretching himself at full length, Vytal folded his arms across his eyes.
Nearly all were now lying asleep, and the fire burned very low. Only Virginia Dare, Dark Eye, and Roger Prat seemed wide-awake.