OLD JORDAN’S “HAUNT.”
Dan came back to his father with the money simply because he could
think of no way of avoiding it that did not involve more personal
risk than he cared to encounter. He took pains, however, to keep out
his share, and gave Godfrey only two dollars and a half, accompanying
it with the assurance that in his (Dan’s) estimation, his father had
been guilty of a very mean trick, and one that he ought to be heartily
ashamed of.
“Didn’t ye tell me ye was satisfied?” asked Godfrey.
“I know it, but I told ye so kase I was afeared if I said I wasn’t, I
wouldn’t get none of the money. O, I know ye, pop, an’ I don’t see why
ye can’t go to work an’ make some money of yer own, ’stead of ropin’ in
on me an’ spilin’ my plans. If ye’d a kept outen the way, I’d a had ten
dollars as easy as fallin’ off a log.”
Godfrey was too much interested in his own thoughts to carry the
discussion any farther. He breathed easier when he felt the money in
his fingers, and because he had no pocket that would hold it, he kept
it in his hand, and stood around with the rest of the hangers-on, and
saw the Emma Deane come up to the landing and deposit the passengers
and cargo she had brought. Like the rest he wondered who the
fashionably-dressed young gentlemen were who got into the general’s
carriage and rode off with him; and he would have wondered still more
had he been able to look far enough into the future to see that he, the
ragged, worthless Godfrey Evans, would one day be the trusted companion
of one of those spruce young fellows, and that he would be intimately
connected with him in a certain piece of business which, when it became
known, would set all the tongues in the country for miles around in
motion.
The general and his nephews drove off; the Emma Deane, as soon as her
freight and passengers were landed, backed out into the stream and
once more turned her head toward New Orleans; the people who had been
brought to the landing by the sound of her whistle spent a few minutes
in exchanging notes, and then began to disperse; and finally the
street was entirely deserted except by a few of the most persistent
loafers, who sat on the boxes in front of Silas Jones’s store, and
whittled and chewed tobacco for want of a better way of passing the
time. Among these was Godfrey, who sunned himself for an hour or
two like a turtle on his log, and then, with a deep sigh of regret,
shouldered his rifle and bent his steps toward the woods in which his
hopeful son Dan had long ago disappeared.
When the afternoon began to draw to a close, nearly the same scenes
which we have already described were enacted at Godfrey’s humble abode.
The scattered family began to come in, one after the other, and they
found Godfrey sitting on the bench smoking his pipe. Dan had a bunch
of squirrels and a fine wild turkey thrown over his shoulder; David
brought another dozen of quails which Don Gordon’s pointer had stood
for him; and Mrs. Evans carried in her pocket a dollar which she had
earned with her needle that day. Fortunately Godfrey did not know of
that. If he had he would at once have set his wits at work to conjure
up some plan to obtain possession of it. David was again called upon to
chop the wood, for Dan had disappeared immediately after skinning the
squirrels he brought (he had gone off to hunt up another hiding-place
for his valuables), and Godfrey was so wearied with his hard day’s work
that he could not have lifted an axe if he had tried. So David cut
the wood and kindled the fire, and his mother cooked the supper, and
Godfrey ate two men’s share of it, and then once more seated himself
on the bench and dozed until dark. He slept two hours or more, and was
aroused by Dan, who wanted to know if he was going to make an effort to
find the barrel that night. Godfrey replied that he was, and started
up with much alacrity; but his enthusiasm seemed to die away utterly
when he rubbed his eyes and looked about him. He could see literally
nothing. It was as dark as it ever gets to be. The cabin and the
clearing seemed to be surrounded by solid walls of ebony. There was not
a ray of light to be seen in any direction, nor even a star.
“Splendid night,” said Dan. “Nothing can’t see us!”
“Yes,” answered his father, “an’ we can’t see nothing, too!”
“Wal, I reckon ye know whar that tater-patch was, don’t ye? Ye said ye
did.”
“Yes, I do; but thar was ten acres into it, Dannie, an’ that’s a power
of ground to dig over with one shovel.”
“But jest think of the eighty thousand,” said Dan.
That was just what Godfrey did think of, and it was the only thing that
could have induced him to brave the darkness and the terrors of the
general’s lane, and undertake so herculean a task as digging up ten
acres of ground with one shovel. Was there not some way in which he
could secure the contents of the barrel, or at least a portion of them,
without the expenditure of any great amount of energy and strength?
“Dannie,” said he, laying his hand on the boy’s shoulder and speaking
in a low, confidential tone, “I’ve been thinkin’ about something
to-day, an’ when ye know what it is, I want ye to tell me if I ain’t
the best pop in the world to ye. I’m gettin’ old, Dannie, an’ my joints
is stiff, an’ the rheumatiz bothers me fearful, an’ ’tain’t healthy to
be out arter dark, kase of the fever ’n ager--leastwise fur an ole man
like me; but fur an’ amazin’ strong, strappin’ feller like yerself, it
don’t make no matter. Now, Dannie, if ye’ll go an’ dig up that thar
bar’l by yerself, I’ll give ye half of it, plump down, jest as soon as
we open it--the very minute.”
“Wal, I won’t do it,” said Dan, promptly.
“What fur?” asked his father.
“Kase why, fur two reasons: If I dig up that thar bar’l all by myself,
I’ll jest hold fast to the hul of it, an’ go snacks with nobody.”
“Hadn’t ye oughter give me something fur tellin’ ye about it?” inquired
his father.
As Dan could not answer this question in any other way than by a reply
in the affirmative, he did not answer it all, but went on to state his
second reason.
“An’ in the next place,” said he, “I don’t know whar the tater-patch
was--thar’s something else planted there now, I reckon--an’ if I did,
ye wouldn’t ketch me out thar alone on sich a night as this, I’ll bet
ye. Thar’s something white walks around out thar!”
“Don’t--don’t, Dannie!” exclaimed Godfrey, casting frightened glances
on all sides of him.
“Wal, ye know it as well as me, don’t ye? I’ll go with ye an’ do my
share of the diggin’, but I won’t go alone--that’s flat!”
Godfrey groaned, and for a moment was on the point of backing squarely
out, and saying that he didn’t believe that the barrel was there; and
if it was it might stay there for all he would do toward digging it
up. But he did not back out. He had the best of reasons for believing
that the barrel _was_ there, and that it was full of gold and silver. A
little extra exertion might put him in possession of it. Perhaps with
the very first blow of the shovel he might strike the treasure, and
then his troubles would all be over. The visions of ease and happiness
which this thought conjured up, gave zeal to his flagging spirits and
courage to his heart; and picking up his hat, which had fallen from his
head while he was dozing on the bench, he told Dan to lead on, and they
would find that barrel if all the white things in the country should
come there to scare them away.
Together they moved off in the darkness, and made their way to the lane
behind the general’s barn, where Dan had hidden the spade in the fence
corner.
It was the work of but a few seconds to find the implement, and then
the father and son climbed the fence and struck off across the fields
toward the potato-patch where the barrel was buried. When they reached
it they found that the field was still planted to potatoes, and Dan
noticed, with no little uneasiness, that it was closer to the house
than he would like to have had it. The noise of the spade striking
against the barrel--when they found it--or a word uttered in too loud a
tone of voice, would arouse Don Gordon’s hounds, and they would alarm
the family, the members of which they could see passing back and forth
before the windows through which the lights shone.
“Say, pop,” said Dan, suddenly; “won’t they see the holes in the
mornin’? An’ if they keep on findin’ ’em, won’t they think thar’s
somethin’ up, an’ watch to see who it is that’s a diggin’ ’em?”
“No, they won’t, kase they won’t see ’em,” replied his father. “We’ll
dig down till we find thar ain’t no bar’l thar, an’ then we’ll shove
the dirt back again, an’ dig in some other place.”
“How deep’ll we have to go?”
“O, not much more’n the deepness of a bar’l, kase why, ye see Jordan
wouldn’t have no time to dig a deep hole to kiver up the bar’l in, when
he knowed that the Yanks was a comin’. He done a good thing fur us,
Jordan did, in runnin’ away without tellin’ his missus whar that bar’l
was hid. Now, Dannie, let’s try right here fust. Ye begin, kase yer the
youngest, an’ I’ll set down an’ smoke an’ watch ye till yer tired. Now
bar in mind that yer workin’ fur eighty thousand dollars! Throw it out
with the fust shovelful an’ I’ll give ye half!”
One to have watched Dan’s movements would have thought that he meant
to accomplish something. He peeled off his coat and threw it on the
ground, dashed his hat down beside it, tucked up his sleeves, moistened
his hands and brought them together with a loud slap, seized the shovel
and thrust it twice into the ground, bringing out each time scarcely
more than a good-sized handful of earth, and then stopped and looked
all around the field as far as his eyes could reach in the darkness.
“Ten acres _is_ a heap o’ ground, pop,” said he.
“Never mind that, Dannie,” replied his father, scratching a match on
his shirt sleeve and applying it to the bowl of his pipe. “Thar’s a
bar’l with eighty thousand dollars in gold an’ silver into it buried
somewhar about here, an’ we must have it if we have to dig up the whole
state of Missip. Laws a massy! what’s the matter of ye?” he exclaimed;
for Dan had stooped down and seized his arm with a gripe that almost
brought from him a cry of pain.
Dan stooped still lower, pointed with his finger and said in a husky
whisper,
“Pop, jest look a thar!”
The tone in which these words were uttered sent the cold chills all
over Godfrey. His breath came in short, quick gasps, his knees knocked
together, and he slowly and painfully arose from the ground, turning
his head as he did so, and looking in the direction Dan pointed. There,
almost within reach of them, so close apparently that he could have
touched it with the shovel, if he had been so disposed, was a little
ball of fire which glowed and sparkled as he looked at it, then faded
almost entirely away for an instant, and anon glowed and sparkled with
greater brilliancy than before. Godfrey’s under jaw dropped down, his
pipe fell to the ground and for a moment he gazed as if fascinated;
then he reached for the shovel, and with long, noiseless steps glided
across the field toward the lane, closely followed by Dan, who hardly
dared to wait long enough to pick up his coat and hat, so frightened
was he. Neither of them spoke until they were fairly in the “big road”
which led to the cabin, and then Dan said, in a suppressed whisper:
“What was it, pop?”
“It’s one of them haunts with eyes of fire like I used to see last
fall,” replied his father, looking back to make sure that the object,
whatever it was, was not following him.
“But this only had one eye, pop!”
“No odds. They all b’long to the same breed, whether they’ve got one
eye or a dozen. Ole nigger Hudson told me he seed one onct that was all
eyes all over his head. Dannie, that was the fust time I ever was clost
enough to one of them critters to see him wink!”
“Say, pop,” exclaimed Dan, suddenly, “I reckon we’d best give up
lookin’ fur that thar bar’l, kase mebbe that’s ole Jordan’s haunt come
back to keep folks away from it.”
Godfrey stopped and looked at his son.
“I’ll bet ye’ve hit centre, Dannie,” said he, after thinking a moment.
“But if that’s so, we was clost to whar the bar’l is, or else the haunt
wouldn’t a been thar. It’ll save us a heap o’ diggin’, Dannie!”
“I’ll bet ye don’t get me nigh that tater patch no more,” said Dan,
decidedly.
“All right. I’ll go myself, an’ ye shan’t have none of the money. Then
what’ll become of yer shiny boots an’ yer circus hosses, and yer fine
guns that break in two in the middle?”
Dan made no answer. He did not like to lose all these nice things
on which he had set his heart, but there was old Jordan’s “haunt”
(that is a term which some people in the South apply to what we call
a ghost), of which he stood in great fear. He could not then make up
his mind just what he would do in the future, so he said nothing more,
and neither did his father. They finished their walk in silence, and
reaching the cabin, went to bed and tried to go to sleep. But that was
for a long time quite impossible. The remembrance of their evening’s
experience kept them awake, and it was not until the gray streaks
of dawn began to stream in through the cracks in the cabin walls,
that they fell into an uneasy slumber. They arose at the usual hour,
however, and David chopped wood while his mother cooked breakfast, and
Dan loafed and Godfrey sat on the bench and smoked and meditated.
The meal over, Dan shouldered his rifle and disappeared, and Godfrey,
because he could not make up his mind to do anything else, resumed his
pipe and his meditations, from which he was aroused by the sight of a
stranger coming along the road from the direction of General Gordon’s.
Godfrey looked closely at him, and saw that he was one of the two young
men whom he had seen land from the steamer Emma Deane on the previous
day. He carried a gun of some description in his hands, a game-bag hung
over his shoulder, and he was dressed in a hunting suit of the latest
and most fashionable cut. He walked leisurely along, stopping now and
then and looking about as if he were searching for some object to try
his skill upon.
“Humph!” sneered Godfrey, who at once took a dislike to the hunter on
account of his good clothes. “Yer a nice lookin’ chap to be loafin’
about with a gun in yer hands. I’ll take my ole Betsey Jane an’ beat
the hind sights off’n a hul army of yer. That’s jest what makes me so
savage agin everybody. What this feller’s clothes cost would keep me
an’ my family in grub all the winter!”
While Godfrey was talking thus to himself, the stranger stopped again,
raised his gun quickly to his shoulder and fired, the weapon making
a report scarcely louder than that of an ordinary gun cap. Godfrey
sneered again, and was about to give it as his private opinion that
such a load as that would not kill anything, when he was surprised to
see a squirrel leave the very topmost branch of a tall hickory that
stood by the roadside, and come to the ground dead. The hunter loaded
his weapon before he went to pick up his game, and Godfrey saw that
he carried a breech-loader. He became interested at once, and began to
have some respect for the stranger who had shown himself to be no mean
marksman. He arose and took his pipe out of his mouth.
“How do?” said he, as he went to meet the hunter. “I ’lowed that ye
wouldn’t get nothing that shot, no how. Ye wouldn’t take no offence if
I should ax ye to let me see that we’pon o’ your’n?”
“Certainly not,” said the stranger politely, removing the cartridge
and handing the rifle to Godfrey. “You do not often see guns of this
description down here, I suppose?”
“I never seed one jest like this afore. I reckon yer from some city up
North, ain’t ye?”
“Yes; I am Clarence Gordon, and my brother and I are down here on a
visit to our cousins, Don and Bert. You are Mr. Evans, I believe.”
“Sarvent, sar,” said Godfrey, who could not remember that any one had
ever put a handle to his name before. He was flattered by this show of
respect, and Clarence could not have approached him in any way better
calculated to gain his good will.
“Well, Mr. Evans, I hope we shall see much of each other,” said
Clarence. “It is possible that I may stay here until spring, that is,
if there is good hunting in the neighborhood; is there?”
“Ye couldn’t come to a better place, if that’s what ye want,” said
Godfrey.
“It is just what I want. I am very fond of it, but I know but little
about it, having always lived in the city, and I shall need somebody to
teach me. I know of no one more capable of acting as my instructor than
yourself.”
Clarence saw by the vacant, bewildered expression on the man’s face
that he did not understand his fine language, so he hastened to add:--
“I am told that you are a fine shot with the rifle and the best hunter
in the country. You never come from the woods without something to show
as a proof of your skill.”
“Wal, that thar’s a fact,” said Godfrey, who now began to see what
Clarence was getting at. “I know right whar all the game rises, an’ as
fur larnin’ folks--wal, thar’s my two boys. They didn’t know nothin’
when I fust took ’em in hand, an’ to-day thar ain’t nobody about here
can beat ’em.”
“Then you are just the man I want, and I wish you would take me in
hand. Squirrels are plenty about here, I suppose?”
“Ye can’t run amiss of ’em.”
“Any deer or turkeys?”
“Now, stranger, yer jest a shoutin’! Is thar any? I killed twenty-three
deer last winter, an’ massy knows how many turkeys, kase I never kept
count of ’em.”
“Are you too busy to go out in the woods with me for a little while?”
“Wal, I _have_ got a sight o’ work to do, that’s a fact,” said Godfrey,
who always tried to make it appear that his time was fully occupied,
“but I reckon it might wait till I get back.”
“I have some cigars in my pocket,” said Clarence, glancing at Godfrey’s
dingy cob-pipe, “and perhaps you would like to shoot my rifle a few
times, just to see how a breech-loader works.”
This made Godfrey sure that his work could wait. He hastened into the
cabin, and presently returned with his gun on his shoulder and his
bullet-pouch under his arm. After he had loaded the weapon, the two
climbed over the fence and disappeared in the woods.