Page:Edgar Huntly, or The Sleep Walker.djvu/229

 my thoughts. The allusions that my friend had made were not unintelligible.—I gained a glimpse of the complicated errors by which we had been mutually deceived.—I had fainted on the area before Deb's hut: I was found by Sarsefield in this condition, and imagined to be dead.

The man whom I had seen upon the promontory was not an Indian; he belonged to a numerous band of pursuers, whom my hostile and precipitate deportment caused to suspect me for an enemy. They that fired from the steep were friends. The interposition that screened me from so many bullets was indeed miraculous. No wonder that my voluntary sinking, in order to elude their shots, was mistaken for death; and that, having accomplished the destruction of this foe, they resumed their pursuit of others. But how was Sarsefield apprized that it was I who plunged into the river? No subsequent event was possible to impart to him the incredible truth.

A pause of mutual silence ensued. At length Sarsefield renewed his expressions of amazement at this interview, and besought me to explain why I had disappeared by night from my uncle's house, and by what series of unheard-of events this interview was brought about. Was it indeed Huntly whom he examined and mourned over at the threshold of Deb's hut—whom he had sought in every thicket and cave in the ample circuit of Norwalk and Chetasco— whom he had seen perish in the current of the Delaware?

Instead of noticing his questions, my soul was harrowed with anxiety respecting the fate of my uncle and sisters. Sarsefield could communicate the tidings which would decide on my future lot, and set my portion in happiness or misery; yet I had not breath to speak my enquiries; hope tottered, and I felt as if a single word would be sufficient for its utter subversion: at length I articulated the name of my uncle.

The single word sufficiently imparted my fears, and these fears needed no verbal confirmation: at that dear name, my companion's features were overspread by sorrow.

"Your uncle," said he, "is dead."