“It’s not very fur now,” said Jim.

The poor, wandering mind was trying to realize the heavenly scenes that it believed were about to burst upon its vision.  The quiet, sunlit water, the trees still bare but bourgeoning, the songs of birds, the blue sky across which fleecy clouds were peacefully floating, the breezes that kissed his fevered cheek, the fragrance of the bordering evergreens, and the electric air that entered his lungs so long accustomed to the poisonous fetor of his cell, were well calculated to foster his delusion, and to fill his soul with a peace to which it had long been a stranger.  An exquisite languor stole upon him, and under the pressure of his long fatigue, his eyelids fell, and he dropped into a quiet slumber.

When the boy saw that his father was asleep, he crept back to Jim and said: 

“Mr. Fenton, I don’t think it’s right for you to tell papa such lies.”

“Call me Jim.  The Doctor called me ‘Mr. Fenton,’ and it ’most killed me.”

“Well, Jim.”

“Now, that sounds like it.  You jest look a here, my boy.  Your pa ain’t livin’ in this world now, an’ what’s true to him is a lie to us, an’ what’s true to us is a lie to him.  I jest go into his world and say what’s true whar he lives.  Isn’t that right?”

This vein of casuistry was new to the boy, and he was staggered.

“When your pa gits well agin, an’ here’s hopin,’ Jim Fenton an’ he will be together in their brains, ye know, and then they won’t be talkin’ like a couple of jay-birds, and I won’t lie to him no more nor I would to you.”

The lad’s troubled mind was satisfied, and he crept back to his father’s feet, where he lay until he discovered Turk, whining and wagging his tail in front of the little hillock that was crowned by Jim’s cabin.

The long, hard, weird journey was at an end.  The boat came up broadside to the shore, and Jim leaped out, and showered as many caresses upon his dog as he received from the faithful brute.

CHAPTER VI.

IN WHICH SEVENOAKS EXPERIENCES A GREAT COMMOTION, AND COMES TO THE CONCLUSION THAT BENEDICT HAS MET WITH FOUL PLAY.

Thomas Buffum and his family slept late on Sunday morning, and the operating forces of the establishment lingered in their beds.  When, at last, the latter rose and opened the doors of the dormitories, the escape of Benedict was detected.  Mr. Buffum was summoned at once, and hastened across the street in his shirt-sleeves, which, by the way, was about as far toward full dress as he ever went when the weather did not compel him to wear a coat.  Buffum examined the inner door and saw that it had been forced by a tremendous exercise of muscular power.  He remembered the loss of the key, and knew that some one had assisted in the operation.

“Where’s that boy?” wheezed the keeper.

An attendant rushed to the room where the boy usually slept, and came back with the report that the bed had not been occupied.  Then there was a search outside for tracks, but the rain had obliterated them all.  The keeper was in despair.  He did not believe that Benedict could have survived the storm of the night, and he did not doubt that the boy had undertaken to hide his father somewhere.