CHAPTER XXVIII.
DEATH SHAKES HANDS WITH THE CASTAWAYS.
The castaways arose on the following morning weaker, but refreshed. Their hunger was not so pressing as upon the previous day, but their steps were slower, and their vitality had decreased. No reference was made by either to the conversation of the previous evening. Ben's face wore a look of great sorrow he could not conceal, and Bertha by numerous little attentions and pretty little ways, that are the sole property of her sex, tried to assuage his woes. Alas, the dear girl did not know that the balm she applied to our friend's wounds made them grow the deeper and break out afresh.
Cleveland exerted himself among the cottonwoods and Bertha carried them to the river. During the morning he told her of his own life, and the nature of the tramp that had led him to his present unfortunate position. It was then for the first time she knew that Ben was the boy's champion in Jersey City, and also the stowaway whose passage her intercessions had secured at Columbus. So little had he occupied her attention on those occasions that had he not informed her she would have remained ignorant of the fact that he was Blackoat's antagonist, or the subject of Mr. Blassfeme's aquatic attentions.
"So then our wreck was not your first acquaintance with the river," she said, laughing.
"No," he replied, "that was my second bath."
Later in the day Ben, after both had been for some time engaged in silence at work on the raft, asked suddenly:
"Bertha, what is your cousin's name?"
"Arthur Blackoat," she replied.
"Arthur Blackoat!" exclaimed he in a voice of apprehension. "Why—" and then he stopped.