The lesson of fear was one which Henderson learned late. He learned it
well, however, when the time came. And it was Blackwater Pot that
taught him.
Sluggishly, reluctantly, impotently, the spruce logs followed one
another round and round the circuit of the great stone pot. The
circling water within the pot was smooth and deep and black, but
streaked with foam. At one side a gash in the rocky rim opened upon
the sluicing current of the river, which rushed on, quivering and
seething, to plunge with a roar into the terrific cauldron of the
falls. Out of that thunderous cauldron, filled with huge tramplings
and the shriek of tortured torrents, rose a white curtain of spray,
which every now and then swayed upward and drenched the green birches
which grew about the rim of the pot. For the break in the rim, which
caught at the passing current and sucked it into the slow swirls of
Blackwater Pot, was not a dozen feet from the lip of the falls.
Henderson sat at the foot of a ragged white birch which leaned from
the upper rim of the pot. He held his pipe unlighted, while he watched
the logs with a half-fascinated stare. Outside, in the river, he saw
them in a clumsy panic haste, wallowing down the white rapids to their
awful plunge. When a log came close along shore its fate hung for a
second or two in doubt. It might shoot straight on, over the lip, into
the wavering curtain of spray and vanish into the horror of the
cauldron. Or, at the last moment, the eddy might reach out stealthily
and drag it into the sullen wheeling procession within the pot. All
that it gained here, however, was a terrible kind of respite, a
breathing-space of agonized suspense. As it circled around, and came
again to the opening by which it had entered, it might continue on
another eventless revolution, or it might, according to the whim of
the eddy, be cast forth once more, irretrievably, into the clutch of
the awful sluice. Sometimes two logs, after a pause in what seemed
like a secret death-struggle, would crowd each other out and go over
the falls together. And sometimes, on the other hand, all would make
the circuit safely again and again. But always, at the cleft in the
rim of the pot, there was the moment of suspense, the shuddering,
terrible panic.
It was this recurring moment that seemed to fasten itself balefully
upon Henderson's imagination, so that he forgot to smoke. He had
looked into the Blackwater before, but never when there were any logs
in the pot. Moreover, on this particular morning, he was overwrought
with weariness. For a little short of three days he had been at the
utmost tension of body, brain, and nerve, in hot but wary pursuit of a
desperado whom it was his duty, as deputy-sheriff of his county, to
capture and bring to justice.
This outlaw, a French half-breed, known through the length and breadth
of the wild backwoods county as "Red Pichot," was the last but
one--and accounted the most dangerous--of a band which Henderson had
undertaken to break up. Henderson had been deputy for two years, and
owed his appointment primarily to his pre-eminent fitness for this
very task. Unacquainted with fear, he was at the same time unrivalled
through the backwoods counties for his subtle woodcraft, his sleepless
endurance, and his cunning.
It was two years now since he had set his hand to the business. One of
the gang had been hanged. Two were in the penitentiary, on life
sentence. Henderson had justified his appointment to every one except
himself. But while Pichot and his gross-witted tool, "Bug" Mitchell,
went unhanged, he felt himself on probation, if not shamed. Mitchell
he despised. But Pichot, the brains of the gang, he honoured with a
personal hatred that held a streak of rivalry. For Pichot, though a
beast for cruelty and treachery, and with the murder of a woman on
his black record--which placed him, according to Henderson's ideas, in
a different category from a mere killer of men--was at the same time a
born leader and of a courage none could question. Some chance dash of
Scotch Highland blood in his mixed veins had set a mop of hot red hair
above his black, implacable eyes and cruel, dark face. It had touched
his villainies, too, with an imagination which made them the more
atrocious. And Henderson's hate for him as a man was mixed with
respect for the adversary worthy of his powers.
Reaching the falls, Henderson had been forced to acknowledge that,
once again, Pichot had outwitted him on the trail. Satisfied that his
quarry was by this time far out of reach among the tangled ravines on
the other side of Two Mountains, he dismissed the two tired river-men
who constituted his posse, bidding them go on down the river to
Greensville and wait for him. It was his plan to hunt alone for a
couple of days in the hope of catching his adversary off guard. He had
an ally, unsuspected and invaluable, in a long-legged, half-wild
youngster of a girl, who lived alone with her father in a clearing
about a mile below the falls, and regarded Henderson with a childlike
hero-worship. This shy little savage, whom all the Settlement knew as
"Baisley's Sis," had an intuitive knowledge of the wilderness and the
trails which rivalled even Henderson's accomplished woodcraft; and the
indomitable deputy "set great store," as he would have put it, by her
friendship. He would go down presently to the clearing and ask some
questions of the child. But first he wanted to do a bit of thinking.
To think the better, the better to collect his tired and scattered
wits, he had stood his Winchester carefully upright between two spruce
saplings, filled his pipe, lighted it with relish, and seated himself
under the old birch where he could look straight down upon the
wheeling logs in Blackwater Pot.
It was while he was looking down into the terrible eddy that his
efforts to think failed him and his pipe went out, and his interest in
the fortunes of the captive logs gradually took the hold of a
nightmare upon his overwrought imagination. One after one he would
mark, snatched in by the capricious eddy and held back a little while
from its doom. One after one he would see crowded out again, by
inexplicable whim, and hurled on into the raging horror of the falls.
He fell to personifying this captive log or that, endowing it with
sentience, and imagining its emotions each time it circled shuddering
past the cleft in the rim, once more precariously reprieved.
At last, either because he was more deeply exhausted than he knew, or
because he had fairly dropped asleep with his eyes open and his
fantastic imaginings had slipped into a veritable dream, he felt
himself suddenly become identified with one of the logs. It was one
which was just drawing around to the fateful cleft. Would it win past
once more? No; it was too far out! It felt the grasp of the outward
suction, soft and insidious at first, then resistless as the falling
of a mountain. With straining nerves and pounding heart Henderson
strove to hold it back by sheer will and the wrestling of his eyes.
But it was no use. Slowly the head of the log turned outward from its
circling fellows, quivered for a moment in the cleft, then shot
smoothly forth into the sluice. With a groan Henderson came to his
senses, starting up and catching instinctively at the butt of the
heavy Colt in his belt. At the same instant the coil of a rope settled
over his shoulders, pinioning his arms to his sides, and he was jerked
backwards with a violence that fairly lifted him over the projecting
root of the birch. As he fell his head struck a stump; and he knew
nothing more.
When Henderson came to his senses he found himself in a most
bewildering position. He was lying face downwards along a log, his
mouth pressed upon the rough bark. His arms and legs were in the
water, on either side of the log. Other logs moved past him
sluggishly. For a moment he thought himself still in the grip of his
nightmare, and he struggled to wake himself. The struggle revealed to
him that he was bound fast upon the log. At this his wits cleared up,
with a pang that was more near despair than anything he had ever
known. Then his nerve steadied itself back into its wonted control.
He realized what had befallen him. His enemies had back-trailed him
and caught him off his guard. He was just where, in his awful dream,
he had imagined himself as being. He was bound to one of the logs down
in the great stone pot of Blackwater Eddy.
For a second or two the blood in his veins ran ice, as he braced
himself to feel the log lurch out into the sluice and plunge into the
trampling of the abyss. Then he observed that the other logs were
overtaking and passing him. His log, indeed, was not moving at all.
Evidently, then, it was being held by some one. He tried to look
around, but found himself so fettered that he could only lift his face
a few inches from the log. This enabled him to see the whole surface
of the eddy and the fateful cleft, and out across the raving torrents
into the white curtain that swayed above the cauldron. But he could
not, with the utmost twisting and stretching of his neck, see more
than a couple of feet up the smooth stone sides of the pot.
As he strained on his bonds he heard a harsh chuckle behind him; and
the log, suddenly loosed with a jerk which showed him it had been
held by a pike-pole, began to move. A moment later the sharp,
steel-armed end of the pike-pole came down smartly on the forward end
of the log, within a dozen inches of Henderson's head, biting a secure
hold. The log again came to a stop. Slowly, under pressure from the
other end of the pike-pole, it rolled outward, submerging Henderson's
right shoulder, and turning his face till he could see all the way up
the sides of the pot.
What he saw, on a ledge about three feet above the water, was Red
Pichot, holding the pike-pole and smiling down upon him smoothly. On
the rim above squatted Bug Mitchell, scowling, and gripping his knife
as if he thirsted to settle up all scores on the instant. Imagination
was lacking in Mitchell's make-up; and he was impatient--so far as he
dared to be--of Pichot's fantastic procrastinatings.
When Henderson's eyes met the evil, smiling glance of his enemy they
were steady and cold as steel. To Henderson, who had always, in every
situation, felt himself master, there remained now no mastery but that
of his own will, his own spirit. In his estimation there could be no
death so dreadful but that to let his spirit cower before his
adversary would be tenfold worse. Helpless though he was, in a
position that was ignominiously and grotesquely horrible, and with the
imminence of an appalling doom close before his eyes, his nerve never
failed him. With cool contempt and defiance he met Red Pichot's
smile.
"I've always had an idee," said the half-breed, presently, in a smooth
voice that penetrated the mighty vibrations of the falls, "ez how a
chap on a log could paddle roun' this yere eddy fer a deuce of a while
afore he'd hev to git sucked out into the sluice!"
As a theory this was undoubtedly interesting. But Henderson made no
answer.
"I've held that idee," continued Pichot, after a civil pause, "though
I hain't never yet found a man, nor a woman nuther, as was willin' to
give it a fair trial. But I feel sure ye're the man to oblige me. I've
left yer arms kinder free, leastways from the elbows down, an' yer
legs also, more or less, so's ye'll be able to paddle easy-like. The
walls of the pot's all worn so smooth, below high-water mark, there's
nothin' to ketch on to, so there'll be nothin' to take off yer
attention. I'm hopin' ye'll give the matter a right fair trial. But ef
ye gits tired an' feels like givin' up, why, don't consider my
feelin's. There's the falls awaitin'. An' I ain't agoin' to bear no
grudge ef ye don't quite come up to my expectations of ye."
As Pichot ceased his measured harangue he jerked his pike-pole loose.
Instantly the log began to forge forward, joining the reluctant
procession. For a few moments Henderson felt like shutting his eyes
and his teeth and letting himself go on with all speed to the
inevitable doom. Then, with scorn of the weak impulse, he changed his
mind. To the last gasp he would maintain his hold on life, and give
fortune a chance to save him. When he could no longer resist, then it
would be Fate's responsibility, not his. The better to fight the awful
fight that was before him, he put clear out of his mind the picture of
Red Pichot and Mitchell perched on the brink above, smoking, and
grinning down upon the writhings of their victim. In a moment, as his
log drew near the cleft, he had forgotten them. There was room now in
all his faculties for but one impulse, one consideration.
The log to which he was bound was on the extreme outer edge of the
procession, and Henderson realized that there was every probability of
its being at once crowded out the moment it came to the exit. With a
desperate effort he succeeded in catching the log nearest to him,
pushing it ahead, and at last, just as they came opposite the cleft,
steering his own log into its place. The next second it shot quivering
forth into the sluice, and Henderson, with a sudden cold sweat jumping
out all over him, circled slowly past the awful cleft. A shout of
ironical congratulation came to him from the watchers on the brink
above. But he hardly heard it, and heeded it not at all. He was
striving frantically, paddling forward with one hand and backward
with the other, to steer his sluggish, deep-floating log from the
outer to the inner circle. He had already observed that to be on the
outer edge would mean instant doom for him, because the outward
suction was stronger underneath than on the surface, and his weighted
log caught its force before the others did. His arms were so bound
that only from the elbows down could he move them freely. He did,
however, by a struggle which left him gasping, succeed in working in
behind another log--just in time to see that log, too, sucked out into
the abyss, and himself once more on the deadly outer flank of the
circling procession.
This time Henderson did not know whether the watchers on the brink
laughed or not as he won past the cleft. He was scheming desperately
to devise some less exhausting tactics. Steadily and rhythmically, but
with his utmost force, he back-paddled with both hands and feet, till
the progress of his log was almost stopped. Then he succeeded in
catching yet another log as it passed and manoeuvring in behind it. By
this time he was halfway around the pot again. Yet again, by his
desperate back-paddling, he checked his progress, and presently, by
most cunning manipulation, managed to edge in behind yet another log,
so that when he again came round to the cleft there were two logs
between him and doom. The outermost of these, however, was dragged
instantly forth into the fury of the sluice, thrust forward, as it
was, by the grip of the suction upon Henderson's own deep log. Feeling
himself on the point of utter exhaustion, he nevertheless continued
back-paddling, and steering and working inward, till he had succeeded
in getting three files of logs between himself and the outer edge.
Then, almost blind and with the blood roaring so loud in his ears that
he could hardly hear the trampling of the falls, he hung on his log,
praying that strength might flow back speedily into his veins and
nerves.
Not till he had twice more made the circuit of the pot, and twice more
seen a log sucked out from his very elbow to leap into the white
horror of the abyss, did Henderson stir. The brief stillness,
controlled by his will, had rested him for the moment. He was cool
now, keen to plan, cunning to husband his forces. Up to the very last
second that he could he would maintain his hold on life, counting
always on the chance of the unexpected.
With now just one log remaining between himself and death, he let
himself go past the cleft, and saw that one log go out. Then, being
close to the wall of the pot, he tried to delay his progress by
clutching at the stone with his left hand and by dragging upon it with
his foot. But the stone surface was worn so smooth by the age-long
polishing of the eddy that these efforts availed him little. Before he
realized it he was almost round again, and only by the most desperate
struggle did he succeed in saving himself. There was no other log near
by this time for him to seize and thrust forward in his place. It was
simply a question of his restricted paddling, with hands and feet,
against the outward draught of the current. For nearly a minute the
log hung in doubt just before the opening, the current sucking at its
head to turn it outward, and Henderson paddling against it not only
with hands and feet, but with every ounce of will and nerve that his
body contained. At last, inch by inch, he conquered. His log moved
past the gate of death; and dimly, again, that ironical voice came
down to him, piercing the roar.
Once past, Henderson fell to back-paddling again--not so violently
now--till other logs came by within his reach and he could work
himself into temporary safety behind them. He was soon forced to the
conviction that if he strove at just a shade under his utmost he was
able to hold his own and keep one log always between himself and the
opening. But what was now his utmost, he realized, would very soon be
far beyond his powers. Well, there was nothing to do but to keep on
trying. Around and around, and again and again around the terrible,
smooth, deliberate circuit he went, sparing himself every ounce of
effort that he could, and always shutting his eyes as the log beside
him plunged out into the sluice. Gradually, then, he felt himself
becoming stupefied by the ceaselessly recurring horror, with the
prolonged suspense between. He must sting himself back to the full
possession of his faculties by another burst of fierce effort.
Fiercely he caught at log after log, without a let-up, till, luck
having favoured him for once, he found himself on the inner instead of
the outer edge of the procession. Then an idea flashed into his
fast-clouding brain, and he cursed himself for not having thought of
it before. At the very centre of the eddy, of course, there must be a
sort of core of stillness. By a vehement struggle he attained it and
avoided crossing it. Working gently and warily he kept the log right
across the axis of the eddy, where huddled a crowd of chips and
sticks. Here the log turned slowly, very slowly, on its own centre;
and for a few seconds of exquisite relief Henderson let himself sink
into a sort of lethargy. He was roused by a sudden shot, and the spat
of a heavy bullet into the log about three inches before his head.
Even through the shaking thunder of the cataract he thought he
recognized the voice of his own heavy Colt; and the idea of that tried
weapon being turned against himself filled him with childish rage.
Without lifting his head he lay and cursed, grinding his teeth
impotently. A few seconds later came another shot, and this time the
ball went into the log just before his right arm. Then he understood,
and woke up. Pichot was a dead shot. This was his intimation that
Henderson must get out into the procession again. At the centre of the
eddy he was not sufficiently entertaining to his executioners. The
idea of being shot in the head had not greatly disturbed him--he had
felt as if it would be rather restful, on the whole. But the thought
of getting a bullet in his arm, which would merely disable him and
deliver him over helpless to the outdraught, shook him with something
near a panic. He fell to paddling with all his remaining strength, and
drove his log once more into the horrible circuit. The commendatory
remarks with which Pichot greeted this move went past his ears
unheard.
Up to this time there had been a strong sun shining down into the pot,
and the trees about its rim had stood unstirred by any wind. Now,
however, a sudden darkness settled over everything, and sharp, fitful
gusts drew in through the cleft, helping to push the logs back.
Henderson was by this time so near fainting from exhaustion that his
wits were losing their clearness. Only his horror of the fatal exit,
the raving sluice, the swaying white spray-curtain, retained its
keenness. As to all else he was growing so confused that he hardly
realized the way those great indrawing gusts, laden with spray, were
helping him. He was paddling and steering and manoeuvring for the
inner circuit almost mechanically now. When suddenly the blackness
about him was lit with a blue glare, and the thunder crashed over the
echoing pot with an explosion that outroared the falls, he hardly
noted it. When the skies seemed to open, letting down the rain in
torrents, with a wind that almost blew it level, it made no difference
to him. He went on paddling dully, indifferent to the bumping of the
logs against his shoulders.
[Illustration: "He was roused by a sudden shot."]
But to this fierce storm, which almost bent double the trees around
the rim of the pot, Red Pichot and Mitchell were by no means so
indifferent. About sixty or seventy yards below the falls they had a
snug retreat which was also an outlook. It was a cabin built in a
recess of the wall of the gorge, and to be reached only by a narrow
pathway easy of defence. When the storm broke in its fury Pichot
sprang to his feet.
"Let's git back to the Hole," he cried to his companion, knocking the
fire out of his pipe. "We kin watch just as well from there, an' see
the beauty slide over when his time comes."
Pichot led the way off through the straining and hissing trees, and
Mitchell followed, growling but obedient. And Henderson, faint upon
his log in the raving tumult, knew nothing of their going.
They had not been gone more than two minutes when a drenched little
dark face, with black hair plastered over it in wisps, peered out from
among the lashing birches and gazed down anxiously into the pot. At
the sight of Henderson on his log, lying quite close to the edge, and
far back from the dreadful cleft, the terror in the wild eyes gave way
to inexpressible relief. The face drew back; and an instant later a
bare-legged child appeared, carrying the pike-pole which Pichot had
tossed into the bushes. Heedless of the sheeting volleys of the rain
and the fierce gusts which whipped her dripping homespun petticoat
about her knees, she clambered skilfully down the rock wall to the
ledge whereon Pichot had stood. Bracing herself carefully, she reached
out with the pike-pole, which, child though she was, she evidently
knew how to use.
Henderson was just beginning to recover from his daze, and to notice
the madness of the storm, when he felt something strike sharply on the
log behind him. He knew it was the impact of a pike pole, and he
wondered, with a kind of scornful disgust, what Pichot could be
wanting of him now. He felt the log being dragged backwards, then held
close against the smooth wall of the pot. A moment more and his bonds
were being cut--but laboriously, as if with a small knife and by weak
hands. Then he caught sight of the hands, which were little and brown
and rough, and realized, with a great burst of wonder and tenderness,
that old Baisley's "Sis," by some miracle of miracles, had come to his
rescue. In a few seconds the ropes fell apart, and he lifted himself,
to see the child stooping down with anxious adoration in her eyes.
"Sis!" he cried. "You!"
"Oh, Mr. Henderson, come quick!" she panted. "They may git back any
minit." And clutching him by the shoulder, she tried to pull him up by
main strength. But Henderson needed no urging. Life, with the return
of hope, had surged back into nerve and muscle; and in hardly more
time than it takes to tell it, the two had clambered side by side to
the rim of the pot and darted into the covert of the tossing trees.
No sooner were they in hiding than Henderson remembered his rifle and
slipped back to get it His enemies had not discovered it. It had
fallen into the moss, but the well-oiled, perfect-fitting chamber had
kept its cartridges dry. With that weapon in his hands Henderson felt
himself once more master of the situation. Weariness and apprehension
together slipped from him, and one purpose took complete possession of
him. He would settle with Red Pichot right there, on the spot where he
had been taught the terrible lesson of fear. He felt that he could not
really feel himself a man again unless he could settle the whole score
before the sun of that day should set.
The rain and wind were diminishing now; the lightning was a mere
shuddering gleam over the hill-tops beyond the river; and the thunder
no longer made itself heard above the trampling of the falls.
Henderson's plans were soon laid. Then he turned to Sis, who stood
silent and motionless close at his side, her big, alert, shy eyes
watching like a hunted deer's the trail by which Red Pichot might
return. She was trembling in her heart at every moment that Henderson
lingered within that zone of peril. But she would not presume to
suggest any move.
Suddenly Henderson turned to her and laid an arm about her little
shoulders.
"You saved my life, kid!" he said, softly. "How ever did you know I
was down there in that hell?"
"I jest _knowed_ it was you, when I seen Red Pichot an' Bug Mitchell
a-trackin' some one," answered the child, still keeping her eyes on
the trail, as if it was her part to see that Henderson was not again
taken unawares. "I _knowed_ it was you, Mister Henderson, an' I
followed 'em; an' oh, I seen it all, I seen it all, an' I most died
because I hadn't no gun. But I'd 'ave killed 'em both, some day, sure,
ef--ef they hadn't went away! But they'll be back now right quick."
Henderson bent and kissed her wet black head, saying, "Bless you, kid!
You an' me'll always be pals, I reckon!"
At the kiss the child's face flushed, and, for one second forgetting
to watch the trail, she lifted glowing eyes to his. But he was already
looking away.
"Come on," he muttered. "This ain't no place for you an' me _yet_."
Making a careful circuit through the thick undergrowth, swiftly but
silently as two wildcats, the strange pair gained a covert close
beside the trail by which Pichot and Mitchell would return to the rim
of the pot. Safely ambuscaded, Henderson laid a hand firmly on the
child's arm, resting it there for two or three seconds, as a sign of
silence.
Minute after minute went by in the intense stillness. At last the
child, whose ears were even keener than Henderson's, caught her breath
with a little indrawing gasp and looked up at her companion's face.
Henderson understood; and every muscle stiffened. A moment later and
he, too, heard the oncoming tread of hurried footsteps. Then Pichot
went by at a swinging stride, with Mitchell skulking obediently at his
heels.
Henderson half raised his rifle, and his face turned grey and cold
like steel. But it was no part of his plan to shoot even Red Pichot in
the back. From the manner of the two ruffians it was plain that they
had no suspicion of the turn which affairs had taken. To them it was
as sure as two and two make four that Henderson was still on his log
in the pot, if he had not already gone over into the cauldron. As they
reached the rim Henderson stepped out into the trail behind them, his
gun balanced ready like a trapshooter's.
As Pichot, on the very brink, looked down into the pot and saw that
his victim was no longer there, he turned to Mitchell with a smile of
mingled triumph and disappointment.
But, on the instant, the smile froze on his face. It was as if he had
felt the cold, grey gaze of Henderson on the back of his neck. Some
warning, certainly, was flashed to that mysterious sixth sense which
the people of the wild, man or beast, seem sometimes to be endowed
with. He wheeled like lightning, his revolver seeming to leap up from
his belt with the same motion. But in the same fraction of a second
that his eyes met Henderson's they met the white flame-spurt of
Henderson's rifle--and then, the dark.
As Pichot's body collapsed, it toppled over the rim into Blackwater
Pot and fell across two moving logs. Mitchell had thrown up his hands
straight above his head when Pichot fell, knowing instantly that that
was his only hope of escaping the same fate as his leader's.
One look at Henderson's face, however, satisfied him that he was not
going to be dealt with on the spot, and he set his thick jaw stolidly.
Then his eyes wandered down into the pot, following the leader whom,
in his way, he had loved if ever he had loved any one or anything.
Fascinated, his stare followed the two logs as they journeyed around,
with Pichot's limp form, face upwards, sprawled across them. They
reached the cleft, turned, and shot forth into the raving of the
sluice, and a groan of horror burst from "Bug's" lips. By this
Henderson knew what had happened, and, to his immeasurable self-scorn,
a qualm of remembered fear caught sickeningly at his heart. But
nothing of this betrayed itself in his face or voice.
"Come on, Mitchell!" he said, briskly. "I'm in a hurry. You jest step
along in front, an' see ye keep both hands well up over yer head, or
ye'll be savin' the county the cost o' yer rope. Step out, now."
He stood aside, with Sis at his elbow, to make room. As Mitchell
passed, his hands held high, a mad light flamed up into his sullen
eyes, and he was on the point of springing, like a wolf, at his
captor's throat. But Henderson's look was cool and steady, and his gun
held low. The impulse flickered out in the brute's dull veins. But as
he glanced at Sis he suddenly understood that it was she who had
brought all this to pass. His black face snarled upon her like a
wolf's at bay, with an inarticulate curse more horrible than any words
could make it. With a shiver the child slipped behind Henderson's back
and hid her face.
"Don't be skeered o' him, kid, not one little mite," said Henderson,
gently. "He ain't agoin' to trouble this earth no more. An' I'm
goin' to get yer father a job, helpin' me, down somewheres near
Greensville--because I couldn't sleep nights knowin' ye was runnin'
round anywheres near that hell-hole yonder!"