had known. The loblolly pine had grown, and the big poplars on the
knoll had expanded a trifle with the passing centuries, but otherwise
the Swamp was the same. And yet how different! The Indians had not
found it friendly, and the Spaniards regarded it as an enemy; but to
Aaron it gave shelter, and sometimes food, and its mysteries were
his companions. Jack-o'-the-Lantern showed him the hidden paths when
the mists of night fell darker than usual. He became as much a part
of the Swamp as the mysteries were, entering into its life, and
becoming native to all its moods and conditions. And his presence
there seemed to give the Swamp new responsibilities. Its thousand
eyes were always watching for his enemies, and its thousand tongues
were always ready to whisper the news of the coming of an alien.
The turkey buzzard, soaring thousands of feet above the top of the
great pine, the blue falcon, suspended in the air a mile away, the
crow, flapping lazily across the fields, stood sentinel during the
day, and the Swamp understood the messages they sent. At night the
Willis-Whistlers were on guard, and their lines extended for miles in
all directions, and the Swamp itself was awake, and needed no warning
message. Sometimes at night the sound of Randall's trumpet fell
on the ear of the Swamp, or the voice of Uncle Fountain was heard
lifted up in song, as he went over the hills to his fish-baskets in
the river; and these were restful and pleasing sounds. Sometimes
the trailing cry of hounds was heard. If in the day, Rambler, the
track dog, would listen until he knew whether the cry came from Jim
Simmons's "nigger dogs," from the Gossett hounds, or from some other
pack. If at night, the Swamp cared little about it, for it was used
to these things after the sun went down.
Mr. Coon insisted on gadding about, and it served him right, the
Swamp insisted, when the hounds picked up his drag--as the huntsmen
say--and brought him home with a whirl. He was safe when he got
there, for let the hounds bay at the door of his house as long as
they might, no hunter with torch and axe would venture into the
Swamp. They had tried it--oh, many times.
_But the door was locked, and the key
Was safely kid in a hollow tree._
If it was merely Cousin Coon who lived up the river, well and good.
It would teach the incurable vagrant a lesson, and the Swamp enjoyed
the fun. The Willis-Whistlers stopped to listen, the mysteries hid
behind the trees, and Jack-o'-the-Lantern extinguished his torch as
the hounds came nearer with their quavering cries. Was it Mr. Coon
or Cousin Coon? Why, Cousin Coon, of course. How did the Swamp know?
It was the simplest thing in the world. Wasn't there a splash and a
splutter as he ran into the quagmire? Wasn't there a snap and a snarl
when the partridge-pea vine caught his foot? Did he know the paths?
Didn't he double and turn and go back the way he came, to be caught
and killed on dry land? Would Mr. Coon of the Swamp ever be caught
on dry land? Don't you believe it! If cut off from home, he would
run to the nearest pond and plunge in. Once there, was there a hound
that would venture to take a bath with him? The Swamp laughed at the
thought of such a thing. Aaron smiled, the White Pig grunted, and
Rambler grinned. Cousin Coon is no more, but Mr. Coon is safe at home
and the Swamp knows it.
_Good luck to all who know the way,
By crooked path and clinging vine!
For them Night's messengers shall stay,
For them the laggard moon shall shine._
But it was not always that aliens and strangers were unwelcome.
Occasionally in the still hours between midnight and dawn the Swamp
would open its doors to Gossett's Riley. He had no key and he had
never come to know and feel that the Swamp was something more than
a mixture of mud and water, trees, canes, vines, and all manner of
flying, creeping, and crawling things. To him the Swamp was merely a
place and not a Thing, but this was ignorance, and the Swamp forgave
it for various reasons, forgave it and pitied him as he deserved
to be pitied. And yet he had qualities out of the common, and for
these the Swamp admired him. He was little more than a dwarf, being
"bow-legged and chuckle-headed," as Susy's Sam used to say, and was
called Chunky Riley, but he was very much of a man for all that. At
a log-rolling there was not a negro for miles around who could pull
him down with the handstick. Aaron could do it, but Aaron was not
a negro, but an Arab, and that is different. Chunky Riley was even
stronger in limb and body than Aaron, but Aaron used his head, as
well as body and limb--and that also is different. Riley was not
swift of foot, but he could run far, as Gossett's hounds well knew.
More than that, he could go on all-fours almost as fast as he could
run on two legs, and that was something difficult to do.
The Swamp found Chunky Riley out in a very curious way. The
first time he came to bring a message to Aaron he waited for no
introduction whatever. The Willis-Whistlers warned him, but he paid
no attention to their warning; the mysteries whispered to him, but
his ears were closed. He searched for no path, and was blind to
all the signals. He blundered into the Swamp and floundered toward
the knoll as the Spaniards did. He floundered out of the quagmire
near where the White Pig lay. He had the scent and all the signs of
an alien, and the White Grunter rushed at him with open mouth. The
Swamp was now angry from centre to circumference, and poor Chunky
Riley's ending would have been swift and sudden but for the fact that
he bore some undeveloped kinship to the elements that surrounded him.
[Illustration: A-STRADDLE OF THE GRUNTER'S BACK]
As the White Pig rushed forward with open mouth, Chunky Riley caught
a vague glimpse of him in the darkness, gave one wild yell, leaped
into the air, and came down a-straddle of the Grunter's back. This
was more than the White Pig had bargained for. He answered Riley's
yell with a loud squeal, and went tearing through the swamp to the
place where Aaron dwelt. The big owl hooted, Rambler howled, and
Jack-o'-the-Lantern threw down his torch and fled. The Swamp that
had been angry was amazed and frightened. What demon was this that
had seized the White Grunter and was carrying him off? What could
the rest hope for if so fierce a creature as the White Pig could be
disposed of in this fashion? Even Aaron was alarmed at the uproar,
for Chunky Riley continued to yell, and the White Pig kept up its
squealing.
It was well that the Grunter, when he came to Aaron's place, ran
close enough to a tree to rub Chunky Riley off his back, otherwise
there is no telling what would have happened. It was well, too, that
Chunky Riley called loudly for Aaron when he fell, otherwise he
would have been made mincemeat of; for as soon as the White Pig was
relieved of his strange burden, his anger rose fiercer than ever, and
he came charging at Chunky Riley, who was lying prone on the ground,
too frightened to do anything more than try to run to a tree on
all-fours. Aaron spoke sharply to the White Pig.
"Shall I use a club on you, White Grunter? Shall I make bacon of you?
You heard him call my name."
The White Pig paused. His small eyes glittered in the dark, and
Chunky Riley heard his tusks grate ominously. He knew the creature
was foaming with rage.
"Ooft! Your name, Son of Ben Ali?" said the White Pig in language
that Chunky Riley thought was merely a series of angry grunts and
snorts. "Ooft! I heard him call for Aaron, and how long has it been
since I heard you say to the Red Chatterer in the hickory-tree
that there were a thousand Aarons, but only one Son of Ben Ali?
Ooft-Gooft! Am I a horse to be ridden? Humph! No man could ride
me--it is what you call a Thing. Umph! let it ride you and then talk
about clubs. Ooft!"
"Is dat Aaron?" Chunky Riley ventured to inquire. "Ef 't is, I wish
you'd be good enough ter run dat ar creetur 'way fum here, kaze I
ain't got no knack fer bein' chaw'd up an' spit out, an' trompled on,
an' teetotally ruint right 'fo' my own face."
"What's your name?" inquired Aaron.
"You ought ter know me, but I dunner whedder you does er not. I'm
name Riley--dey calls me Chunky Riley fer short."
Aaron was silent for a moment, as if trying to remember the name.
Presently he laughed and said: "Why, yes; I know you pretty well.
Come, we'll kindle a fire."
"No suh--not me! Not less'n you'll run dat ar wil' hog off. He mo'
servigrous dan a pant'er. Ef I hadn't er straddled 'im des now he'd
'a' e't me bodaciously up an' dey wouldn't 'a' been nothin' lef' but
de buttons on my cloze, an' nobody in de roun' worl' would 'a' know'd
dey wuz buttons."
Aaron laughed while speaking to the White Pig: "Get to bed, Grunter.
It is the Lifter--the man that is as strong in the back as a horse."
"Gooft-ooft! Let him ride you out as he rode me in--ooft! He's no
man! Gooft! No bed for me. When a horse is ridden, he must eat, as
I've heard you say, Son of Ben Ali. Gooft-ooft!"
The White Pig, still grinding his tusks together, turned and trotted
off into the darkness, and presently Aaron and Chunky Riley heard him
crashing through the canes and reeds. Then Aaron kindled his fire.
"Why did you come?" inquired the Son of Ben Ali when the two had made
themselves comfortable.
"Des ter fetch word dat Marster wuz layin' off ter git atter you wid
Simmons's nigger-dogs 'fo' long."
"All the way through the dark for that? When did you come to like me
so well?"
"Oh, 't ain't 'zackly dat," replied Chunky Riley frankly. "I hear um
talkin' 'bout it when marster an' dat ar Mr. Simmons wuz walkin' out
in de hoss lot. I wuz in de corn crib, an' dey didn't know it, an' I
des sot dar an' lis'n at um. An' den dis mornin' I seed dat ar little
Marse Abercrombie, an' he say, 'Go tell Aaron quick ez you kin.'"
"The child with the crutches?" queried Aaron.
"De ve'y same," replied Chunky Riley. He paused awhile and then
added: "I'd walk many a long mile fer dat white chil', day er night,
rain er shine."
He gazed in the flickering fire a long time, waiting for Aaron to
make some comment. Hearing none, he finally turned his eyes on his
companion. Aaron was looking skyward, where one small star could be
seen twinkling through the ascending smoke from the fire, and his
lips were moving, though they framed no words that Chunky Riley
could hear. Something in the attitude of the Son of Ben Ali disturbed
the negro.
"Well, I done what I come ter do," he said, making a pretense of
stretching himself and yawning, "an' I speck I'd better be gwine."
The Son of Ben Ali still kept his eye fixed on the twinkling star.
"What pesters me," Chunky Riley went on, "is de idee dat dat ar wil'
hog went 'zackly de way I got ter go. I don't want ter hatter ride
'im no mo' less'n I got a saddle an' bridle."
"Come!" exclaimed Aaron suddenly, "I'll go with you. I want to see
the Little Master."
"De dogs'll fin' yo' track sho, ef dey start out to-morrer,"
suggested Chunky Riley.
The only response the Son of Ben Ali made to this suggestion was to
say: "Take the end of my cane in your hand and follow it. We'll take
a short cut."
Chunky Riley had queer thoughts as he followed his tall conductor,
being led as if he were a blind man; but he said nothing. Presently
(it seemed but a few minutes to Chunky Riley) they stood on the top
of a hill.
"Look yonder!" said Aaron. Away to the left a red light glimmered
faintly.
"What dat?" asked the superstitious negro.
"The light in the Little Master's window."
"How came it so red, den?" inquired Chunky Riley.
"Red curtain," replied Aaron curtly.
"Well, de Lord he'p us! Is we dat close?" cried Chunky Riley.
"Your way is there," said the Son of Ben Ali; "this is mine."
The negro stood watching Aaron until his tall form was lost in the
darkness.
III.
WHAT CHUNKY RILEY SAW AND HEARD
Left alone, Chunky Riley stood still and tried to trace in his mind
the route he and Aaron had followed in coming from the Swamp. But he
could make no mental map--and he knew every "nigh-cut" and by-path
for miles around--that would fit in with the time it had taken them
to reach the spot where he now stood. He looked back toward the
Swamp, but the night covered it, and he could see nothing. Then he
looked around him, to see if he knew his present whereabouts. Oh,
yes, that was easy; every foot of ground was familiar.
The hill on which he had stood had been given over to scrub pines.
The hill itself sloped away to the Turner old fields. But still he
was puzzled, and still he scratched his head, for he knew that the
Swamp was a good four miles away--nearly five--and it seemed to him
that he and Aaron had been only a few minutes in making the journey.
So he scratched his head and wondered to himself whether Aaron was
really a "conjur' man."
It was perhaps very lucky for Chunky Riley that he stopped when he
did. If he had kept on he would have run into the arms of three men
who were going along the plantation path that led from Gossett's
negro quarters to the Abercrombie Place. The delay that Chunky Riley
made prevented him from meeting them, but it did not prevent him from
hearing the murmur of their voices as he struck into the path. They
were too far off for Chunky Riley to know whether they were white or
black, but just as he turned into the path to go to Gossett's the
scent of a cigar floated to his nostrils. He paused and scratched
his head again. He knew by the scent of the cigar that the voices
he heard belonged to white men: but who were they? If they were the
"patterollers" they'd catch Aaron beyond all question; it would be
impossible for him to escape.
So thought Chunky Riley, and so thinking, he turned and followed the
path towards the Abercrombie Place. He moved rapidly but cautiously.
The scent of the cigar grew stronger, the sound of men's voices fell
more distinctly on his ear. Chunky Riley left the path and skirted
through the low pines until he came to the fence that inclosed the
spring lot. He knew that if he was heard, the men would think he was
a calf, or, mayhap, a mule; for the hill on which Aaron had left him
was now a part of a great pasture, in which the calves and dry cattle
and (between seasons) the mules were allowed to roam at will.
Coming to the fence, Chunky Riley would have crossed it, but the
voices were louder now, and he caught a glimpse of the red sparks of
lighted cigars. Creeping closer and closer, but ever ready to drop
on the ground and run away on all-fours, Chunky Riley was soon able
to hear what the men were saying. He knew the voices of his master
and young master, Mr. Gossett--Old Grizzle, as he was called--and
George, and he rightly judged that the strange voice mingling with
theirs belonged to Mr. Jim Simmons, who, with a trained pack of
hounds,--"nigger dogs" they were called,--held himself at the service
of owners of runaway negroes.
Mr. Simmons's average fee was $15--that is to say when he was
"called in time." But in special cases his charge was $30. When
Chunky Riley arrived within earshot of the group, Mr. Gossett was
just concluding a protest that he had made against the charge of $30,
which he had reluctantly agreed to pay for the capture of Aaron.
"You stayed at my house to-day, you'll stay there to-night, and maybe
you'll come back to dinner to-morrow. There's the feeding of you and
your dogs. You don't take any account of that at all."
Mr. Gossett's voice was sharp and emphatic. His stinginess was
notorious in that region, and gave rise to the saying that Gossett
loved a dollar better than he did his wife. But he was no more
ashamed of his stinginess than he was of the shabbiness of his hat.
"But, Colonel," remonstrated Mr. Jim Simmons, "didn't you send for
me? Didn't you say, 'Glad to see you, Simmons; walk right in and make
yourself at home'? You did, fer a fact." He spoke with a drawl that
irritated the snappy and emphatic Mr. Gossett.
"Why, certainly, Simmons; certainly I did. I mentioned the matter to
show you that your charges are out of all reason in this case. All
you have to do is to come here with your dogs in the morning, skirt
around the place, pick up his trail, and there you are."
"But, Colonel!" insisted Mr. Jim Simmons with his careless,
irritating drawl, "ain't it a plum' fact that this nigger's been
in the woods a month or sech a matter? Ain't it a plum' fact that
you've tracked him and trailed him with your own dogs?--and good
dogs they are, and I'll tell anybody so. Now what do you pay me fer?
Fer catching the nigger? No, sirree! The nigger's as good as caught
now--when it comes to that. You pay me fer knowing how to catch
him--that's what you pay me fer. You send fer the doctor. He comes
and fumbles around a little, and you have to pay the bill whether he
kills or cures. You don't pay him fer killing or curing; you pay him
fer knowing how to fumble around. It's some different with me. If I
don't catch your nigger, you button up your pocket. If I do catch him
you pay me $30 down, not fer catching him, but fer knowing how to
fumble around and catch him."
The logic of this argument, which was altogether lost on Chunky
Riley, silenced Mr. Gossett, but did not convince him. There was a
long pause, as if all three of the men were wrestling with peculiar
thoughts. Finally Mr. Gossett spoke:--
"It ain't so much the nigger I'm after, but I want to show
Abercrombie that I can't be outdone. He's laughing in his sleeve
because I can't keep the nigger at home, and I'll be blamed"--here
his voice sank to a confidential tone--"I'll be blamed if I don't
believe that, between him and that son of his, they are harboring the
nigger. Yes, sir, harboring is the word."
Mr. Jim Simmons threw down his lighted cigar with such energy as to
cause the sparks to fly in all directions. A cigar was an unfamiliar
luxury to Mr. Simmons, and he had had enough of it.
"Addison Abercrombie harboring a nigger!" exclaimed Mr. Simmons.
"Why, Colonel, if every man, woman, and child in the United States
was to tell me that I wouldn't believe it. Addison Abercrombie! Why,
Colonel, though you're his next-door neighbor, as you may say, you
don't know him half as well as I do. You ought to get acquainted
with that man."
"Humph! I know him well enough, I reckon," responded Mr. Gossett. "I
went to school with him. Folks get to know one another at school. He
was always stuck up, trying to hold his head higher than anybody else
because his daddy had money and a big plantation. I made my prop'ty
myself; I earned every dollar; and I know how it came."
"But, Colonel!" Mr. Jim Simmons insisted, "Addison Abercrombie would
hold his head high if he never seen a dollar, and he'd have the right
to do it. Him harbor niggers? Shucks, Colonel! You might as well tell
me that the moon ain't nothing but a tater pudding."
"What do you see in the man?" Mr. Gossett asked with some irritation
in the tones of his voice.
There was a pause, as though Mr. Simmons was engaged in getting his
thoughts together. Finally he said:--
"Well, Colonel, I don't reckon I can make it plain to you, because
when I come to talk about it I can't grab the identical idee that
would fit what I've got in my mind. But I'll tell you what's the
honest truth, in my opinion--and I'm not by myself, by a long
shot--Addison Abercrombie is as fine a man as ever trod shoe leather.
That's what."
"Humph!" grunted Mr. Gossett.
"Yes, sirree!" persisted Mr. Simmons, warming up a little. "It makes
no difference where you see him, nor when you see him, nor how you
see him, you can up and say: 'The Lord has made many men of many
minds, and many men of many kinds, but not sence Adam has he made a
better man than Addison Abercrombie.' That's the way I look at it,
Colonel. I may be wrong, but if I am I'll never find it out in this
world."
Plainly, Mr. Gossett was not prepared to hear such a tribute as
this paid to Addison Abercrombie, and he winced under it. He hemmed
and hawed, as the saying is, and changed his position on the fence.
He was thoroughly disgusted. Now there was no disagreement between
Mr. Gossett and Mr. Abercrombie,--no quarrel, that is to say,--but
Gossett knew that Abercrombie regarded him with a feeling akin to
contempt. He treasured in his mind a remark that Abercrombie had
made about him the day he bought Aaron from the negro speculator.
He never forgot nor forgave it, for it was an insinuation that Mr.
Gossett, in spite of his money and his thrifty ways, was not much of
a gentleman.
On this particular subject Mr. Gossett was somewhat sensitive, as
men are who have doubts in their own minds as to their standing. Mr.
Gossett had an idea that money and "prop'ty," as he called it, made a
gentleman; but it was a very vague idea, and queer doubts sometimes
pestered him. It was these doubts that made him "touchy" on this
subject.
"What has this great man ever done for you, Simmons?" Mr. Gossett
asked, with a contemptuous snort.
"Not anything, Colonel, on the top of the green globe. I went to him
once to borrow some money, and he wanted to lend it to me without
taking my note and without charging me any interest. I says to him,
says I, 'You'll have to excuse me.'"
"That was right; you did perfectly right, Simmons. The man was trying
to insult you."
"But, Colonel, he didn't go about it that way. Don't you reckon you
could tell when anybody was trying to insult you? That was the time I
come to you."
"I charged you interest, didn't I, Simmons?"
"You did, Colonel, fer a fact."
"I'm this kind of a man, Simmons," remarked Mr. Gossett, with a touch
of sincere pride and gratification in his voice. "When I do business
with a man I do business. When I do him a favor it must be outside
of business. It's mixing the two things up that keeps so many people
poor."
"What two things, Colonel?" gravely inquired Simmons.
"Why the doing of business and--er--the doing of favors."
"Oh, I see," said Mr. Simmons, as if a great light had been turned on
the matter. Then he laughed and continued: "Yes, Colonel, I borrowed
the money from you and just about that time the fever taken me down,
and if it hadn't 'a' been fer Addison Abercrombie the note I give you
would have swallowed my house and land."
"Is that so?" inquired Mr. Gossett.
"Ask my wife," replied Mr. Simmons. "One day while I was out of my
head with the fever, Addison Abercrombie, he rid by and saw my wife
setting on the front steps, jest a-boohooing,--you know how wimmen
will do, Colonel; if they ain't a-jawing they're a-cryin'. So Addison
Abercrombie, he ups and asks her what's the matter, and Jennie, she
tells him. He got right off his hoss and come in, and set by my
bed the better part of the morning. And all that time there I was
a-running on about notes and a-firing off my troubles in the air.
So the upshot of the business was that Addison Abercrombie left the
money there to pay the note and left word for me to pay him back when
I got good and ready; and Jennie hadn't hardly dried her eyes before
here come a nigger on horseback with a basket on his arm, and in the
basket was four bottles of wine. Wine! Why, Colonel, it was worse
'n wine. Jennie says that if arry one of the bottles had 'a' had a
load of buckshot in it, the roof would 'a' been blow'd off when the
stopper flew out. And, Colonel! if ever you feel like taking a right
smart of exercise, jest pass my house some day and stick your head
over the palings and tell Jennie that Addison Abercrombie's got a
streak of meanness in him."
"Have you ever paid Abercrombie?" Mr. Gossett inquired. His voice was
harsh and businesslike.
"I was laying off to catch this nigger of yours and pay him some on
account," replied Mr. Simmons.
"Why, it has been three years since you paid me," suggested Mr.
Gossett.
"Two years or sech a matter," remarked Mr. Simmons complacently.
"Then that's the reason you think Abercrombie ain't harboring my
nigger?" inquired Mr. Gossett scornfully.
"But, Colonel," drawled Mr. Simmons, "what under the sun ever got
the idee in your head that Addison Abercrombie _is_ harboring your
nigger?"
"It's as simple as a-b ab," Mr. Gossett replied with energy. "He
tried to buy the nigger off the block and couldn't, and now he thinks
I'll sell if the nigger'll stay in the woods long enough. That's the
reason he's harboring the nigger. And more than that: don't I know
from my own niggers that the yaller rapscallion comes here every
chance he gets? He comes, but he don't go in the nigger quarters.
Now, where does he go?"
"Yes, where?" said Mr. Gossett's son George, who up to that moment
had taken no part in the conversation. "Three times this month I've
dealt out an extra rasher of bacon to two of our hands, and they tell
the same tale."
"It looks quare," Mr. Simmons admitted, "but as sure as you're born
Addison Abercrombie ain't the man to harbor a runaway nigger. If he's
ever had a nigger in the woods, it's more'n I know, and when that's
the case you may set it down fer a fact that he don't believe in
runaway niggers." This was a lame argument, but it was the best that
Mr. Simmons could muster at the moment.
"No," remarked Mr. Gossett sarcastically, "his niggers don't take to
the woods because they do as they blamed please at home. It sets my
teeth on edge to see the way things are run on this plantation. Why,
I could take the stuff that's flung away here and get rich on it in
five years. It's a scandal."
"I believe you!" assented his son George dutifully.