“PRICE,” began Mahaffy. They were back in Raleigh in the room the judge
called his office, and this was Mahaffy's first opportunity to ease his
mind on the subject of the duel, as they had only just parted from Yancy
and Cavendish, who had stopped at one of the stores to make certain
purchases for the raft.
“Not a word, Solomon--it had to come. I am going to kill him. I shall
feel better then.”
“What if he kills you?” demanded Mahaffy harshly. The judge shrugged his
shoulders.
“That is as it may be.”
“Have you forgotten your grandson?” Mahaffy's voice was still harsh and
rasping.
“I regard my meeting with Fentress as nothing less than a sacred duty to
him.”
“We know no more than we did this morning,” said Mahaffy. “You are
mixing up all sorts of side issues with what should be your real
purpose.”
“Not at all, Solomon--not at all! I look upon my grandson's speedy
recovery as an assured fact. Fentress dare not hold him. He knows he is
run to earth at last.”
“Price--”
“No, Solomon--no, my friend, we will not speak of it again. You will
go back to Belle Plain with Yancy and Cavendish; you must represent me
there. We have as good as found Hannibal, but we must be active in Miss
Malroy's behalf. For us that has an important bearing on the future, and
since I can not, you must be at Belle Plain when Carrington arrives
with his pack of dogs. Give him the advantage of your sound and
mature judgment, Solomon; don't let any false modesty keep you in the
background.”
“Who's going to second you?” snapped Mahaffy.
The judge was the picture of indifference.
“It will be quite informal, the code is scarcely applicable; I merely
intend to remove him because he is not fit to live.”
“At sun-up!” muttered Mahaffy.
“I intend to start one day right even if I never live to begin another,”
said the judge, a sudden fierce light flashing from his eyes. “I feel
that this is the turning point in my career, Solomon!” he went on. “The
beginning of great things! But I shall take no chances with the future,
I shall prepare for every possible contingency. I am going to make you
and Yancy my grandson's guardians. There's a hundred thousand acres of
land hereabout that must come to him. I shall outline in writing the
legal steps to be taken to substantiate his claims. Also he will inherit
largely from me at my death.”
Something very like laughter escaped from Mahaffy's lips.
“There you go, Solomon, with your inopportune mirth! What in God's name
have I if I haven't hope? Take that from me and what would I be?
Why, the very fate I have been fighting off with tooth and nail would
overwhelm me. I'd sink into unimportance--my unparalleled misfortunes
would degrade me to a level with the commonest! No, sir, I've never been
without hope, and though I've fallen I've always got up. What Fentress
has is based on money he stole from me. By God, the days of his
profit-taking are at an end! I am going to strip him. And even if I
don't live to enjoy what's mine, my grandson shall! He shall wear
velvet and a lace collar and ride his pony yet, by God, as a gentleman's
grandson should!”
“It sounds well, Price, but where's the money coming from to push a
lawsuit?”
The judge waved this aside.
“The means will be found, Solomon. Our horizon is lifting--I can see it
lift! Don't drag me back from the portal of hope! We'll drink the stuff
that comes across the water; I'll warm the cockles of your heart with
imported brandy. I carry twenty years' hunger and thirst under my
wes-coat and I'll feed and drink like a gentleman yet!” The judge
smacked his lips in an ecstasy of enjoyment, and dropping down before
the table which served him as a desk, seized a pen.
“It's good enough to think about, Price,” admitted Mahaffy grudgingly.
“It's better to do; and if anything happens to me the papers I am going
to leave will tell you how it's to be done. Man, there's a million of
money in sight, and we've got to get it and spend it and enjoy it! None
of your swinish thrift for me, but life on a big scale--company, and
feasting, and refined surroundings!”
“And you are going to meet Fentress in the morning?” asked Mahaffy. “I
suppose there's no way of avoiding that?”
“Avoiding it?” almost shouted the judge. “For what have I been living?
I shall meet him, let the consequences be what they may. To-night when
I have reduced certain facts to writing I shall join you at Belle Plain.
The strange and melancholy history of my life I shall place in your
hands for safe keeping. In the morning I can be driven back to Boggs'.”
“And you will go there without a second?”
“If necessary; yes.”
“I declare, Price, you are hardly fitted to be at large! Why, you act as
if you were tired of life. There's Yancy--there's Cavendish!”
The judge gave him an indulgent but superior smile.
“Two very worthy men, but I go to Boggs' attended by a gentleman or I go
there alone. I am aware of your prejudices, Solomon; otherwise I might
ask this favor of you.”
Mr. Mahaffy snorted loudly and turned to the door, for Yancy and
Cavendish were now approaching the house, the latter with a meal sack
slung over his shoulder.
“Here, Solomon, take one of my pistols,” urged the judge hastily. “You
may need it at Belle Plain. Goodby, and God bless you!”
Just where he had parted from Ware, Carrington sat his horse, his brows
knit and his eyes turned in the direction of the path. He was on his way
to a plantation below Girard, the owner of which had recently imported
a pack of bloodhounds; but this unexpected encounter with Ware had
affected him strangely. He still heard Tom's stammering speech, he was
still seeing his ghastly face, and he had come upon him with startling
suddenness. He had chanced to look back over his shoulder and when he
faced about there had been the planter within a hundred yards of him.
Presently Carrington's glance ceased to follow the windings of the path.
He stared down at the gray dust and saw the trail left by Hues and his
party. For a moment he hesitated; if the dogs were to be used with
any hope of success he had no time to spare, and this was the merest
suspicion, illogical conjecture, based on nothing beyond his distrust
of Ware. In the end he sprang from the saddle and leading his horse into
the woods, tied it to a sapling.
A hurried investigation told him that five men had ridden in and out of
that path. Of the five, all coming from the south, four had turned
south again, but the fifth man--Ware, in other words--had gone north. He
weighed the possible significance of these facts.
“I am only wasting time!” he confessed reluctantly, and was on the point
of turning away, when, on the very edge of the road and just where the
dust yielded to the hard clay of the path, his glance lighted on the
print of a small and daintily shod foot. The throbbing of his heart
quickened curiously.
“Betty!” The word leaped from his lips.
That small foot had left but the one impress. There were other signs,
however, that claimed his attention; namely, the bootprints of Slosson
and his men; and he made the inevitable discovery that these tracks
were all confined to the one spot. They began suddenly and as suddenly
ceased, yet there was no mystery about these; he had the marks of the
wheels to help him to a sure conclusion. A carriage had turned just
here, several men had alighted, they had with them a child or a woman.
Either they had reentered the carriage and driven back as they had come,
or they had gone toward the river. He felt the soul within him turn
sick.
He stole along the path; the terror of the river was ever in his
thoughts, and the specter of his fear seemed to flit before him and lure
him on. Presently he caught his first glimpse of the bayou and his legs
shook under him; but the path wound deeper still into what appeared to
be an untouched solitude, wound on between the crowding tree forms,
a little back from the shore, with an intervening tangle of vines
and bushes. He scanned this closely as he hurried forward, scarcely
conscious that he was searching for some trampled space at the water's
edge; but the verdant wall preserved its unbroken continuity, and twenty
minutes later he came within sight of the Hicks' clearing and the keel
boat, where it rested against the bank.
A little farther on he found the spot where Slosson had launched the
skiff the night before. The keel of his boat had cut deep into the
slippery clay; more than this, the impress of the small shoe was
repeated here, and just beside it was the print of a child's bare foot.
He no longer doubted that Betty and Hannibal had been taken across the
bayou to the cabin, and he ran back up the path the distance of a mile
and plunged into the woods on his right, his purpose being to pass
around the head of the expanse of sluggish water to a point from which
he could later approach the cabin. But the cabin proved to be better
defended than he had foreseen; and as he advanced, the difficulties of
the task he had set himself became almost insurmountable; yet sustained
as he was by his imperative need, he tore his way through the labyrinth
of trailing vines, or floundered across acre-wide patches of green slime
and black mud, which at each step threatened to engulf him in their
treacherous depths, until at the end of an hour he gained the southern
side of the clearing and a firmer footing within the shelter of the
woods.
Here he paused and took stock of his surroundings. The two or three
buildings Mr. Hicks had erected stood midway of the clearing and were
very modest improvements adapted to their owner's somewhat flippant
pursuit of agriculture. While Carrington was still staring about him,
the cabin door swung open and a woman stepped forth. It was the girl
Bess. She went to a corner of the building and called loudly:
“Joe! Oh, Joe!”
Carrington glanced in the direction of the keel boat and an instant
later saw Slosson clamber over its side. The tavern-keeper crossed to
the cabin, where he was met by Bess, who placed in his hands what
seemed to be a wooden bowl. With this he slouched off to one of the
outbuildings, which he entered. Ten or fifteen minutes slipped by,
then he came from the shed and after securing the door, returned to
the cabin. He was again met by Bess, who relieved him of the bowl; they
exchanged a few words and Slosson walked away and afterward disappeared
over the side of the keel boat.
This much was clear to the Kentuckian: food had been taken to some one
in the shed--to Betty and the boy!--more likely to George.
He waited now for the night to come, and to him the sun seemed fixed in
the heavens. At Belle Plain Tom Ware was watching it with a shuddering
sense of the swiftness of its flight. But at last the tops of the tall
trees obscured it; it sank quickly then and blazed a ball of fire beyond
the Arkansas coast, while its dying glory spread aslant the heavens,
turning the flanks of the gray clouds to violet and purple and gold.
With the first approach of darkness Carrington made his way to the shed.
Hidden in the shadow he paused to listen, and fancied he heard difficult
breathing from within. The door creaked hideously on its wooden hinges
when he pushed it open, but as it swung back the last remnant of the
day's light showed him some dark object lying prone on the dirt floor.
He reached down and his hand rested on a man's booted foot.
“George--” Carrington spoke softly, but the man on the floor gave no
sign that he heard, and Carrington's questioning touch stealing higher
he found that George--if it were George--was lying on his side with his
arms and legs securely bound. Thinking he slept, the Kentuckian shook
him gently to arouse him.
“George?” he repeated, still bending above him. This time an
inarticulate murmur answered him. At the same instant the woolly head
of the negro came under his fingers and he discovered the reason of his
silence. He was as securely gagged as he was bound.
“Listen, George--it's Carrington--I am going to take off this gag, but
don't speak above a whisper--they may hear us!” And he cut the cords
that held the gag in place.
“How yo' get here, Mas'r Ca'ington?” asked the negro guardedly, as the
gag fell away.
“Around the head of the bayou.”
“Lawd!” exclaimed George, in a tone of wonder.
“Where's Miss Betty?”
“She's in the cabin yonder--fo' the love of God, cut these here
other ropes with yo' knife, Mas'r Ca'ington--I'm perishin' with 'em!”
Carrington did as he asked, and groaning, George sat erect. “I'm like I
was gone to sleep all over,” he said.
“You'll feel better in a moment. Tell me about Miss Malroy?”
“They done fetched us here last night. I was drivin' Missy into
Raleigh--her and young Mas'r Hazard--when fo' men stop us in the road.”
“Who were they, do you know?” asked Carrington.
“Lawd--what's that?”
Carrington, knife in hand swung about on his heel. A lantern's light
flashed suddenly in his face and Bess Hicks, with a low startled cry
breaking from her lips, paused in the doorway. Springing forward,
Carrington seized her by the wrist.
“Hush!” he grimly warned.
“What are you doin' here?” demanded the girl, as she endeavored to shake
off his hand, but Carrington drew her into the shed, and closing the
door, set his back against it. There was a brief silence during which
Bess regarded the Kentuckian with a kind of stolid fearlessness. She was
the first to speak. “I reckon you-all have come after Miss Malroy,” she
observed quietly.
“Then you reckon right,” answered Carrington. The girl studied him from
beneath her level brows.
“And you-all think you can take her away from here,” she speculated. “I
ain't afraid of yo' knife--you-all might use it fast enough on a
man, but not on me. I'll help you,” she added. Carrington gave her an
incredulous glance. “You don't believe me? What's to hinder my calling
for help? That would fetch our men up from the keel boat. No--yo'-all's
knife wouldn't stop me!”
“Don't be too sure of that,” said Carrington sternly. The girl met the
menace of his words with soft, fullthroated laughter.
“Why, yo' hand's shakin' now, Mr. Carrington!”
“You know me?”
“Yes, I seen you once at Boggs'.” She made an impatient movement. “You
can't do nothing against them fo' men unless I help you. Miss Malroy's
to go down river to-night; they're only waiting fo' a pilot--you-all's
got to act quick!”
Carrington hesitated.
“Why do you want Miss Malroy to escape?” he said.
The girl's mood changed abruptly. She scowled at him.
“I reckon that's a private matter. Ain't it enough fo' you-all to know
that I do? I'm showing how it can be done. Them four men on the keel
boat are strangers in these parts, they're waiting fo' a pilot, but they
don't know who he'll be. I've heard you-all was a riverman; what's to
hinder yo' taking the pilot's place? Looks like yo' was willing to risk
yo' life fo' Miss Malroy or you wouldn't be here.”
“I'm ready,” said Carrington, his hand on the door.
“No, you ain't--jest yet,” interposed the girl hastily. “Listen to me
first. They's a dugout tied up 'bout a hundred yards above the keel
boat; you must get that to cross in to the other side of the bayou, then
when yo're ready to come back yo're to whistle three times--it's the
signal we're expecting--and I'll row across fo' you in one of the
skiffs.”
“Can you see Miss Malroy in the meantime?”
“If I want to, they's nothin' to hinder me,” responded Bess sullenly.
“Tell her then--” began Carrington, but Bess interrupted him.
“I know what yo' want. She ain't to cry out or nothin' when she sees
you-all. I got sense enough fo' that.”
Carrington looked at her curiously.
“This may be a serious business for your people,” he said significantly,
and watched her narrowly.
“And you-all may get killed. I reckin if yo' want to do a thing bad
enough you don't mind much what comes after,” she answered with a hard
little laugh, as she went from the shed.
“Come!” said Carrington to the negro, when he had seen the cabin door
close on Bess and her lantern; and they stole across the clearing.
Reaching the bayou side they began a noiseless search for the dugout,
which they quickly found, and Carrington turned to George. “Can you
swim?” he asked.
“Yes, Mas'r.”
“Then go down into the water and drag the canoe farther along the
shore--and for God's sake, no sound!” he cautioned.
They placed a second hundred yards between themselves and the keel boat
in this manner, then he had George bring the dug-out to the bank, and
they embarked. Keeping within the shadow of the trees that fringed the
shore, Carrington paddled silently about the head of the bayou.
“George,” he at length said, bending toward the negro; “my horse is tied
in the woods on the right-hand side of the road just above where you
were taken from the carriage last night--you can be at Belle Plain
inside of an hour.”
“Look here, Mas'r Ca'ington, those folks yonder is kin to Boss Hicks. If
he get his hand on me first don't you reckon he'll stop my mouth? I been
here heaps of times fotchin' letters fo' Mas'r Tom,” added George.
“Who were the letters for?” asked the Kentuckian, greatly surprised.
“They was fo' that Captain Murrell; seems like him and Mas'r Tom was
mixed up in a sight of business.”
“When was this--recently?” inquired Carrington. He was turning this
astonishing statement of the slave over in his mind.
“Well, no, Mas'r; seems like they ain't so thick here recently.”
“I reckon you'd better keep away from the big house yet a while,” said
Carrington. “Instead of going there, stop at the Belle Plain landing.
You'll find a raft tied up to the shore, it belongs to a man named
Cavendish. Tell him what you know. That I've found Miss Malroy and the
boy, tell him to cast off and drift down here. I'll run the keel boat
aground the first chance I get, so tell him to keep a sharp lookout.”
A few minutes later they had separated, George to hurry away in search
of the horse, and Carrington to pass back along the shore until he
gained a point opposite the clearing. He whistled shrilly three times,
and after an interval of waiting heard the splash of oars and presently
saw a skiff steal out of the gloom.
“Who's there?” It was Bess who asked the question.
“Carrington,” he answered.
“Lucky you ain't met the other man!” she said as she swept her skiff
alongside the bank.
“Lucky for him, you mean. I'll take the oars,” added Carrington as he
entered the skiff.
Slowly the clearing lifted out of the darkness, then the keel boat
became distinguishable; and Carrington checked the skiff by a backward
stroke of the oars.
“Hello!” he called.
There was no immediate answer to his hail, and he called again as he
sent the skiff forward. He felt that he was risking all now.
“What do you want?” asked a surly voice.
“You want Slosson!” quickly prompted the girl in a whisper.
“I want to see Slosson!” said Carrington glibly and with confidence, and
once more he checked the skiff.
“Who be you?”
“Murrell sent you,” prompted the girl again, in a hurried whisper.
“Murrell--” And in his astonishment Carrington spoke aloud.
“Murrell?” cried the voice sharply.
“--sent me!” said Carrington quickly, as though completing an unfinished
sentence. The girl laughed nervously under her breath.
“Row closter!” came the sullen command, and the Kentuckian did as he was
bidden. Four men stood in the bow of the keel boat, a lantern was
raised aloft and by its light they looked him over. There was a moment's
silence broken by Carrington, who asked:
“Which one of you is Slosson?” And he sprang lightly aboard the keel
boat.
“I'm Slosson,” answered the man with the lantern. The previous night Mr.
Slosson had been somewhat under the enlivening and elevating influence
of corn whisky, but now he was his own cheerless self, and rather
jaded by the passing of the hours which he had sacrificed to an irksome
responsibility. “What word do you fetch from the Captain, brother?” he
demanded.
“Miss Malroy is to be taken down river,” responded Carrington. Slosson
swore with surpassing fluency.
“Say, we're five able-bodied men risking our necks to oblige him!
You can get married a damn sight easier than this if you go about it
right--I've done it lots of times.” Not understanding the significance
of Slosson's allusion to his own matrimonial career, Carrington held his
peace. The tavern-beeper swore again with unimpaired vigor. “You'll find
mighty few men with more experience than me,” he asserted, shaking his
head. “But if you say the word--”
“I'm all for getting shut of this!” answered Carrington promptly, with
a sweep of his arm. “I call these pretty close quarters!” Still shaking
his head and muttering, the tavernkeeper sprang ashore and mounted the
bank, where his slouching figure quickly lost itself in the night.
Carrington took up his station on the flat roof of the cabin which
filled the stern of the boat. He was remembering that day in the sandy
Barony road--and during all the weeks and months that had intervened,
Murrell, working in secret, had moved steadily toward the fulfilment of
his desires! Unquestionably he had been back of the attack on Norton,
had inspired his subsequent murder, and the man's sinister and
mysterious power had never been suspected. Carrington knew that the
horse-thieves and slave stealers were supposed to maintain a loosely
knit association; he wondered if Murrell were not the moving spirit in
some such organization.
“If I'd only pushed my quarrel with him!” he thought bitterly.
He heard Slosson's shuffling step in the distance, a word or two when
he spoke gruffly to some one, and a moment later he saw Betty and the boy,
their forms darkly silhouetted against the lighter sky as they moved
along the top of the bank. Slosson, without any superfluous gallantry,
helped his captives down the slope and aboard the keel boat, where he
locked them in the cabin, the door of which fastened with a hasp and
wooden peg.
“You're boss now, pardner!” he said, joining Carrington at the steering
oar.
“We'll cast off then,” answered Carrington.
Thus far nothing had occurred to mar his plans. If they could but quit
the bayou before the arrival of the man whose place he had taken, the
rest would be if not easy of accomplishment, at least within the realm
of the possible.
“I reckon you're a river-man?” observed Slosson.
“All my life.”
The line had been cast off, and the crew with their setting poles were
forcing the boat away from the bank. All was quietly done; except for
an occasional order from Carrington no word was spoken, and soon the
unwieldy craft glided into the sluggish current and gathered way. Mr.
Slosson, who clearly regarded his relation to the adventure as being of
an official character, continued to stand at Carrington's elbow.
“What have we, between here and the river?” inquired the latter. It was
best, he felt, not to give Slosson an opportunity to ask questions.
“It narrows considerably, pardner, but it's a straight course,” said
Slosson. “Black in yonder, ain't it?” he added, nodding ahead.
The shores drew rapidly together; they were leaving the lakelike expanse
behind. In the silence, above the rustling of the trees, Carrington
heard the first fret of 'the river against its bank. Slosson yawned
prodigiously.
“I reckon you ain't needing me?” he said.
“Better go up in the bow and get some sleep,” advised Carrington, and
Slosson, nothing loath, clambered down from the roof of the cabin and
stumbled forward.
The ceaseless murmur of the rushing waters grew in the stillness as the
keel boat drew nearer the hurrying yellow flood, and the beat of the
Kentuckian's pulse quickened. Would he find the raft there? He glanced
back over the way they had come. The dark ranks of the forest walled off
the clearing, but across the water a dim point of light was visible. He
fixed its position as somewhere near the head of the bayou. Apparently
it was a lantern, but as he looked a ruddy glow crept up against the
sky-line.
From the bow Bunker had been observing this singular phenomenon.
Suddenly he bent and roused Slosson, who had fallen asleep. The
tavern-keeper sprang to his feet and Bunker pointed without speaking.
“Mebby you can tell me what that light back yonder means?” cried
Slosson, addressing himself to Carrington; as he spoke he snatched up
his rifle.
“That's what I'm trying to make out,” answered Carrington.
“Hell!” cried Slosson, and tossed his gun to his shoulder.
What seemed to be a breath of wind lifted a stray lock of Carrington's
hair, but his pistol answered Slosson in the same second. He fired at
the huddle of men in the bow of the boat and one of them pitched forward
with his arms outspread.
“Keep back, you!” he said, and dropped off the cabin roof.
His promptness had bred a momentary panic, then Slosson's bull-like
voice began to roar commands; but in that brief instant of surprise and
shock Carrington had found and withdrawn the wooden peg that fastened
the cabin door. He had scarcely done this when Slosson came tramping aft
supported by the three men.
Calling to Betty and Hannibal to escape in the skiff which was towing
astern the Kentuckian rushed toward the bow. At his back he heard the
door creak on its hinges as it was pushed open by Betty and the boy, and
again he called to them to escape by the skiff. The fret of the current
had grown steadily and from beneath the wide-flung branches of the
trees which here met above his head, Carrington caught sight of the
starspecked arch of the heavens beyond. They were issuing from the
bayou. He felt the river snatch at the keel boat, the buffeting of some
swift eddy, and saw the blunt bow swing off to the south as they were
plunged into the black shore shadows.
But what he did not see was a big muscular hand which had thrust itself
out of the impenetrable gloom and clutched the side of the keel boat.
Coincident with this there arose a perfect babel of voices, high-pitched
and shrill.
“Sho--I bet it's him! Sho'--it's Uncle Bob's nevvy! Sho', you can hear
'em! Sho', they're shootin' guns! Sho'!”
Carrington cast a hurried glance in the direction of these sounds. There
between the boat and the shore the dim outline of a raft was taking
shape. It was now canopied by a wealth of pale gray smoke that faded
from before his eyes as the darkness lifted. Turning, he saw Slosson and
his men clearly. Surprise and consternation was depicted on each face.
The light increased. From the flat stone hearth of the raft ascended
a tall column of flame which rendered visible six pygmy figures,
tow-headed and wonderfully vocal, who were toiling like mad at the huge
sweeps. The light showed more than this. It showed a lady of plump and
pleasing presence smoking a cobpipe while she fed the fire from a tick
stuffed with straw. It showed two bark shanties, a line between them
decorated with the never-ending Cavendish wash. It showed a rooster
perched on the ridge-pole of one of these shanties in the very act of
crowing lustily.
Hannibal, who had climbed to the roof of the cabin, shrieked for help,
and Betty added her voice to his.
“All right, Nevvy!” came the cheerful reply, as Yancy threw himself over
the side of the boat and grappled with Slosson.
“Uncle Bob! Uncle Bob!” cried Hannibal.
Slosson uttered a cry of terror. He had a simple but sincere faith in
the supernatural, and even with the Scratch Hiller's big hands gripping
his throat, he could not rid himself of the belief that this was the
ghost of a murdered man.
“You'll take a dog's licking from me, neighbor?” said Yancy grimly. “I
been saving it fo' you!”
Meanwhile Mr. Cavendish, whose proud spirit never greatly inclined him
to the practice of peace, had prepared for battle; Springing aloft he
knocked his heels together.
“Whoop! I'm a man as can slide down a thorny locust and never get
scratched!” he shouted. This was equivalent to setting his triggers;
then he launched himself nimbly and with enthusiasm into the thick of
the fight. It was Mr. Bunker's unfortunate privilege to sustain the
onslaught of the Earl of Lambeth.
The light from the Cavendish hearth continued to brighten the scene,
for Polly was recklessly sacrificing her best straw tick. Indeed her
behavior was in every way worthy of the noble alliance she had formed.
Her cob-pipe was not suffered to go out and with Connie's help she kept
the six small Cavendishes from risking life and limb in the keel boat,
toward which they were powerfully drawn. Despite these activities she
found time to call to Betty and Hannibal on the cabin roof.
“Jump down here; that ain't no fittin' place for you-all to stop in with
them gentlemen fightin'!”
An instant later Betty and Hannibal stood on the raft with the little
Cavendishes flocking about them. Mr. Yancy's quest of his nevvy
had taken an enduring hold on their imagination. For weeks it had
constituted their one vital topic, and the fight became merely a
satisfying background for this interesting restoration.
“Sho', they'd got him! Sho'--he wa'n't no bigger than Richard! Sho'!”
“Oh!” cried Betty, with a fearful glance toward the keel boat. “Can't
you stop them?”
“What fo'?” asked Polly, opening her black eyes very wide.
“Bless yo' tender heart!-you don't need to worry none, we got them
strange gentlemen licked like they was a passel of children! Connie,
you-all mind that fire!”
She accurately judged the outcome of the fight. The boat was little
better than a shambles with the havoc that had been wrought there
when Yancy and Carrington dropped over its side to the raft. Cavendish
followed them, whooping his triumph as he came.