“Warren, promise me by this grave that you will forgive my father the wrongs he has done you.”
“Let _that_,” he said, kissing her pleading lips, “be the seal to the promise which I grant with all my heart.”
“Ho! ho! ho! by the mysteries of the Aërial Demon! Here am I in the camp of a party of lords and ladies!”
All eyes were turned upon the speaker. It was the mysterious Solomon Strange, who had appeared from the forest at this juncture, and halted in their midst.
Florence and Silvia changed significant smiles.
“I am glad to meet you, Mr. Strange,” said Captain Walraven.
“And I, you, my lord, but you all seem as serious as though you were in a graveyard reading the inscriptions on the gravestones.”
“Sir, those ladies’ father lies buried there,” said Frank, pointing to the grave.
“Ho! ho!” laughed Strange; “and how know you that, my boy?”
“Because I helped to bury him there,” returned Frank.
“And what would you think, boy, if I, Solomon Strange, gifted with the power of the ancient soothsayers, should tell you that you are guilty of burying a _live man there_?”
“I would think you were a fool,” retorted Frank.
“‘To err is human, to forgive divine,’ but I will prove it to you, my boy,” said Strange; and, as he concluded, began to unfasten the strips of bark and twisted grass from his limbs.
This done, his ragged garments dropped from his body, revealing it dressed in a fashionable suit of dark cloth. Then the man placed his hands to his head and face, and tore off the wig and mask of long yellow hair and whiskers, and--
_Colonel Wayland Sanford stood before them in perfect health!_
The young sportsmen, the two hunters and Rodger Rainbolt were completely dumbfounded, and started back as if from a ghost, unable to utter a word.
A merry peal of laughter rung from the sisters’ lips. They knew their father lived, and were prepared for the meeting. He had made known his existence to Florence in the Indian encampment, hence their private interviews there. Florence then communicated the fact to Silvia.
“Ha! ha! ha!” laughed the colonel; “do you believe now, my boy, that you buried a live man, _there_?”
“Uncle Wayland Sanford!” exclaimed Frank, realizing the startling fact, “how in the name of Heaven did you escape?”