CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.
REACHING THE PLANTATION.
A deep growl and a loud burst of barking roused Nic Revel from his deepsleep, free from fever, calm and refreshed, to lie listening to thedogs, wondering what it all meant.
The sun was up, and horizontal rays were streaming in betweenill-fitting boards and holes from which knots had fallen consequent uponthe shrinking of the wood. There was a feeling of cool freshness in theair, too, that was exhilarating; but for a few moments Nic could notmake out where he was.
Then the slight confusion passed away, as he heard the rustling ofleaves, and turned to see his companions stirring and yawning, while atthe same moment a dog's great head was butted at him as if its ownerwere a playful sheep, and it then drew back, swinging its tail slowlyfrom side to side.
The next minute the heavy bar was swung down, the great padlock rattled,and the door was drawn open, to let in a flood of light, followed by thetwo blacks who had fitted on the irons, but who now bore a huge loaf ofbread and a pitcher of water; while two more blacks, each shouldering amusket, closed in behind them, to stand as if framed in the doorway.
"Heah, jump up," cried the big smith. "Make has'e; eat your brakfas''fore you go to de boat."
As he spoke he turned an empty barrel with its head upward, banged theloaf down upon it, drew a knife from its sheath in his belt, and countedthe prisoners over with the point of the blade. He then drew a fewimaginary lines upon the top of the loaf, paused to rub his woolly headwith the haft, looking puzzled and as if cutting the loaf into as manypieces as there were prisoners bothered him, and ended by making a dashat his task.
He cut the loaf in half, then divided it into quarters, and went onworking hard as he made these eighths, and finally sixteenths.
By this time the top of the barrel was covered.
"Now, den, 'tan' in a row," he cried importantly.
The men scowled, but they were hungry, and obeyed, the black stickingthe point of his knife into the chunks he had cut, and handing a pieceto each in turn, beginning with Humpy Dee, who did not seem any theworse for his immersion, and ending with Nic.
After this he began again with Humpy, went down the line again, and hadbegun for the third time when it suddenly struck him that there wouldnot be enough to go round, and he snatched the piece back.
Humpy Dee uttered a furious growl, and made a step forward to recoverit; but the big black presented the point of the knife at him andshouted:
"Ah, what dat? You back, sah, 'fore set de dog at you."
Humpy growled like one of the beasts, and resumed his place in the line,and the black went on calmly dividing the remaining pieces, distributedthem, and called up the dogs to catch what remained.
The water was then passed round, the blacks went off leaving thesentries in position, and the prisoners sat amongst the Indian-cornleaves, to eat their breakfast ravenously enough.
Before they had finished, the barking of the dogs announced the comingof the overseer, who came in, whip in hand, to run his eye over hisprisoners, nodding his satisfaction as he saw that he was not going backminus any of them, and went out again.
Then, as Nic sat eating the remainder of his bread, the entry wasdarkened a little, and he saw a couple of women peer in--one amiddle-aged, comely body, the other a young girl.
There was a pitying expression upon their faces; and, obeying a suddenimpulse, Nic stood up to go to speak to them, for it seemed to him thathis chance had come. But at his first movement Humpy Dee leaped up,with his fetters clinking, to intercept him, a sour look upon his face,and the frightened women ran away.
"No, you don't," growled Humpy; "not if I knows it, m'lad."
"You, sah--you go back and eat your brakfas', sah," came from the door;and Humpy turned sharply, to see that their guards were standing, eachwith his musket steadied against a doorpost, taking aim at him and Nic.
"Yah, you old pot and kettle," cried Humpy scornfully; "you couldn't hita haystack;" but he went back to his place and sat down, Nic giving upwith a sigh and following his example.
Half-an-hour after the overseer was back with the dogs, the order wasgiven, and the prisoners marched out, to find the blacks waiting. Nicsaw now that there was a roomy log-house, fenced round with a patch ofgarden; and in a group by the rough pine-wood porch a burly-looking manwas standing with the two women; and half-a-dozen black slaves were atthe far end of the place, each shouldering a big clumsy hoe, andwatching, evidently with the greatest interest, the prisoners on theirway to the boat.
In his hasty glance round, Nic could see that the farm was newly wonfrom the wilderness, and encumbered with the stumps of the great treeswhich had been felled, some to be used as logs, others to be cut up intoplanks; but the place had a rough beauty of its own, while the wistfulglances that fell upon him from the occupants of the porch sent a thrillthrough his breast, and raised a hope that if ever he came that way hemight find help.
But his heart sank again as his eyes wandered to the black labourers,and then to a couple of huge dogs similar to those which followed behindwith the overseer; for he knew that he was among slave-owners, and inhis despondency he could not help asking himself what chance he wouldhave, an escaped prisoner, if he tried to get away.
He had little time for thought, but he took in the surroundings of theplace quickly, noting that the house and out-buildings stood well raisedupon a mound, round one side of which the creek they had turned intoran; while through the trees some little distance away there was theriver, and across it the forest, rising from the farther bank, not blackand forbidding now, but beautiful in the early morning sunshine.
The overseer shouted a hearty good-bye to the people by the porch, andthere was a friendly reply, as they marched on to where the boat layfastened to a stump; the dogs sprang in to retake their places, barkingtheir farewell to the others which trotted down to look on; a big basketof provisions was next put on board by the smith and his assistant, andthen the prisoners were sent forward to their old places, Pete glancingonce at Nic, whose eyes were wandering here and there; but Nic avoidedthe glance.
"Now you, sir," cried the overseer; "don't stand staring about. In withyou."
Nic obeyed as soon as there was room, and the overseer took his placeastern.
A minute later they were being poled along the creek, which was here andthere overarched by the spreading boughs of the trees, and soon afterthey were out in the main stream, with the blacks rowing steadily inwater which seemed to be very slack; the little settlement was seen as abright spot for a few minutes, and then disappeared behind the trees,which began upon the left bank, and became once more a great green wallto shut out everything else.
And then hour after hour the boat was rowed onward, the river windingfar less than on the previous evening, and seeming to form a highroadinto the interior, upon which they were the only travellers. It variedlittle in its width at first, but towards afternoon Nic noted that itwas beginning to narrow considerably; but it ran always through forest.As thoughts of escape would intrude, and the poor fellow scanned thebanks, he quickly grasped the fact that if an attempt were made it mustbe by the river, for the forest on either side seemed to be impassable,and how far it ran inland was impossible to say.
A change was made every hour or so, the prisoners taking their turn withthe oars; and before the morning was far advanced the overseer orderedNic into one of the places, watching him intently as he obeyed and fellinto stroke at once, rowing hard for a few minutes in the hot sunshinewithout a murmur. Then all at once the trees on the bank began to sailround, the oar slipped from his hand, and he fell backward into Pete'sarms.
When he opened his eyes again he was sitting forward in the bottom ofthe boat, with one of the blacks supporting him and splashing water fromover the side in his face, while the overseer stood looking down grimly.
"You needn't take another turn," he said gruffly; "I wanted to seewhether you could do your share."
The rest of the day Nic sa
t watching their progress, a good deal of itthrough the gloomy shades of a great swamp, through which the river ranat times almost in twilight, the faint current being marked by thedifference in colour and the freedom from the vegetation which markedthe waters of the great lagoon spreading away to right and left amongthe trees, which grew and fell and rotted as far as eye could penetrate.
The vegetation, was rich, but it seemed to be that of a dying forestwhich had been inundated by the stream, for bank there was none. Hugecypresses stood out at every angle, many having fallen as far as theycould, but only to be supported by their fellows. And as the boat wentswiftly on in obedience to the sturdily-tugged oars, Nic forgot histroubles in wonder at the strangeness of the scene through which hepassed, for it was dreary, horrible, and beautiful all in one. Rottingvegetation supplied the rich, muddy soil from which rose vine andcreeper to climb far on high, and then, finding no further support,throw themselves into the air, to hang and swing where the brightsunshine penetrated. Wherever it was shadowy the trees were draped withhanging curtains of moss; while all around Nic looked down vistas oflight and shade, whose atmosphere was now golden, now of a score ofdifferent delicious greens.
There was something so new and strange about the swamp that it had afascination for Nic, and he was leaning over the bows, resting his chinupon his hand, when he had his first glance at one of its inhabitants;for, as the boat was being steered past a moss-covered, rotting stump,the gnarled wood suddenly seemed to become animated, a portion of itrising a little and then gliding away with a heavy splash into thewater.
Before he could realise what it was, there was another movement justbeyond, and this time he made out plainly enough the gaping mouth,prominent eyes, and rugged back of a great alligator, followed by itswaving tail, as it dived down from a cluster of tree-roots out of sight.
After this the reptiles became common enough, for the swamp swarmed withthem, and Nic realised that it might be a strangely-perilous task tomake his way through the forest unless provided with a boat.
The men whispered to themselves as the reptiles scuttled about in theireagerness to escape, and shook their heads; and as Nic turned fromobserving them to gaze aft he became conscious of the fact that theoverseer was watching them with a grim smile upon his lips, readingtheir thoughts respecting the dangers of an attempt to escape.
The dogs were evidently familiar with the sight of the reptiles, rarelypaying any heed to them save when the boat approached quietly andaroused a sleeper, which in its surprise raised its great jawsmenacingly, when one of the dogs would set up the hair about its neck,growl, and make a savage snap at the reptile; and after a while theprisoners grew in turn accustomed to the loathsome-looking creatures.
"But we might seize the boat," thought Nic, "in the case of no helpcoming;" and he sat there more and more grasping the fact that after allhe might be forced to depend upon the aid and companionship of thosearound him, and be compelled to master the dislike and repulsion whichthey inspired.
Another stoppage at a woodland farm for the night, and then on again fora fresh day's toil as monotonous as the last.
At the different changes made, the rowers left their oars dripping withperspiration, for the swamp seemed breathless and the heat intense; buttowards evening a faint breeze sprang up, and instead of its growingdarker there was a lightening in the appearance of the place; thesetting sun sent a red glow among the trees, and then they passed out ofthe forest into a lovely, dreamy, open country, stretching for miles andmiles towards where a range of hills ran right across their course,beyond which, pale orange by the fading light, another range of greaterheight appeared. Soon after they passed the mouth of a clear stream,and at the end of another mile the boat was turned suddenly off to theirright into a little river of the clearest water, which ran meanderingthrough a lightly-wooded slope rising towards the hills; and as Nic wasgazing at the fairy-like scene, whose atmospheric effects seemed, evenin his despondent state, far more beautiful than anything he had everseen at home, the boat swept round a curve whose banks were thickly setwith trees, and once more there was a human habitation in sight, in theshape of a well-built, farm-like house upon a knoll, and the agitationamongst the dogs warned the prisoners that here was their resting-placefor the night.
The next minute, as the dogs were barking, the boat was steered closeinshore, and the brutes bounded over into the shallow water, to scrambleup the bank, and set off as fast as they could go towards the house,from which figures could be seen issuing; and at last, as Nic scannedthe signs of cultivation around, the growing crops roughly fenced, andthe out-buildings, the thought struck him that this might be theirdestination.
While he was wondering whether this were so, the boat was run into alittle creek only big enough to let it pass for about a couple ofhundred yards before it grounded where a track came down to some posts;and as the boat was secured to one of these the overseer sprang ashoreto meet a tall, sun-browned, grey-haired man, whose keen eyes weredirected towards the bows of the boat.
"Back again, then, Saunders!" he said sharply. "Well, what sort of alot do they seem?"
"Rough, but strong," replied the overseer; "all but one young fellow whohas been knocked about, but he seems as if he'll soon come round."
"Like so many horses or bullocks," said Nic to himself bitterly, "and Iam the one with broken knees."