The vultures were still screaming over his head, venting their rage over being disturbed in their feast, as Jack hastily brushed the tears from his eyes and looked more clearly around him.

“Poor Plum!” he exclaimed, “this is indeed a sad fate. It seems a certain fatality for any one to be my friend. But I suppose you were killed for your money. It seems only decent that I should give your bones human burial.”

With his knife and the stirrups taken from the trappings of his horse, Jack hollowed out a spot to receive all that was left of the body he had found.

By the time he had finished the sad task it was quite dark in the forest, so he knew he must get away from the lonely place as soon as possible, if he valued his own life.

With a last farewell look at the wildwood grave which he was never to see again, he rode away through the wilderness.

He soon found, however, that his horse was so spent that it must have rest before going much further.

As impatient as he was to reach Cobija, wondering what Captain Hillgrove would think of his prolonged absence, he yielded to the unavoidable and stopped awhile in the heart of the forest.

It was broad daylight when he rode into De la Pama on a used up horse and himself quite fagged out.

But notwithstanding his condition, he felt obliged to push on for Cobija, dreading lest he should find Captain Hillgrove already gone. Accordingly remounting the pony he had previously ridden, he started for the sea coast at a rapid gait.

The wiry little animal made a remarkable record, but he might as well have been on the road another day, as it seemed, for he found his worst fears realized.

Captain Hillgrove had sailed!

Whither should he turn now? What should he do? Never in his life had he felt so lonely and so near despair as he did at that time. The indomitable pluck which had carried him through so many trials began to leave him. Then, he rallied, exclaiming:

“I will earn money enough to take me back to the United States on the first ship that comes this way. Perhaps with a sample of my nitrate I------”

He suddenly felt a heavy hand laid on his shoulder, and turning he was both astonished and pleased to find one of the seaman of the Elizabeth standing beside him!

“Ahoy, shipmate!” greeted the sailor, giving the true nautical pitch, “so I’ve follered you into port at last, though it’s a sorry cruise I’ve had.”

“Captain Hillgrove!” cried Jack, elated. “Where is he?”

“Outside, shipmate. He durstn’t stay inside longer, and he sent me to keep a lookout for you. I was giving you up when I clapped my old watchdogs on you. You are ready to go out to the Elizabeth in my boat?”

Jack’s reply was an exclamation of joy and a more fervant grip of the honest old tar’s hand.

“Captain Hillgrove had not deserted me after all!”

Without further trouble or delay the couple made the trip to the waiting vessel, when Jack was greeted by the bluff old skipper:

“Bless my eyes! but I had given you up to old Davy Jones.”

“And I thought you had left me in the lurch,” said Jack frankly, as he cringed under the grip given his hand by the other.

“I did not dare stay in Cobija longer, my hearty. If I had done so nary a bit of your dust would have been left on the Elizabeth. Bless my eyes! but I’m just overflowing and roaring glad--run up the yards lads. Lively, lads! put the old Elizabeth on her wings. We must be a long way from here afore sun-up.”

Exciting scenes followed, of which Jack was a spectator and not an actor. For the present his work was done, and he had time now to ponder upon his ups and downs, hardly able to believe that at last he was really on his homeward journey. He felt far more confident in the care of bluff Captain Hillgrove than in that of the fickle Peruvians.

Nor was his confidence misplaced, for the night passed without anything occurring to interrupt their progress, and when the sun rose the following morning it found them many leagues from land, and bowling merrily on their way.

Captain Hillgrove listened to his account of the fate of poor Plum Plucky with a feeling of sorrow, though he had never met the young American.

Jack’s return home was something of a triumph, though he was saddened by the loss of his companion during those trying scenes he could not put from his mind, while his longings to reach home were tinged with those forebodings one cannot escape who has been away so long, and the nearer he approached his native land the more ominous became those feelings!

Were his parents still living and well? Was--was Jenny still true to him? What had she thought of his long, weary years of absence? Until then he had not realized that he had been away so long.

At last the old Elizabeth was safely moored at her dock.

Though Captain Hillgrove was anxious to know what the result of their speculation was going to be, he allowed Jack time to hunt up his relatives and friends before the nitrate was moved from the ship’s hold.

I cannot begin to explain the joyous reception accorded our hero at his home, for many had given him up as dead.

With a tremulous tongue he asked for Jenny dreading, doubting, expecting he knew not what; and then his cup of happiness overflowed at the thrice-welcome news of her well-being and faithfulness to him, and that she had just returned to her native town.

Jenny was not only living and well, but she had never given up looking for him, believing he would some day return to her.

The sweet happiness of the meeting between the pair is too sacred to be revealed.

When the first transport of his reception home had passed, Jack proceeded to put on the market his ship-load of nitrate, to be met with another rebuff in the checkered wheel of fortune.

He could find no one with faith in the virtue of his product brought from the wilds of South America.

Captain Hillgrove began to think he had made a profitless voyage, though be it said to his credit, he stood ever by Jack.

The latter met the words of scorn uttered against him with his characteristic good-nature. Some of the nitrate was put in the hands of competent chemists, and still more with practical agriculturists.

“I shall win out,” said Jack confidently.

“I trust so with all my heart,” answered Jenny.

At last some favorable reports came in and then the load of nitrates was sold at a fair profit. Of the amount Jack got several hundred dollars, the rest going to the captain of the Elizabeth.

Chapter XXIV