Chapter XX: A Spell of Paddling

I remained silent on the limb of the cypress. Even the irksomeness of my seat did not tempt me to descend.

I was now sensible of being in a position of real peril. The men were murderers--all four of them--and one more crime would be lightly added to their last. Taking my life would be a step necessary for their own safety, and I knew that if discovered I might expect but a short shrift of it. It needed nothing more to secure my silence.

I did not design remaining there forever, only until night. Then I should descend, make my way to the dug-out, which I hoped to find in its place, and, favored by this and the darkness, slip silently out of the lagoon into the open river. This was the plan traced out.

As nothing could be done before night, I summoned all my patience to await it. And all of it was called into play. Never in my life do I remember having spent what appeared a longer day. I thought it would have no end--that the sun was never to set. It was still early when I arrived at the foot of the cypress, for I had started by the first light to go toward the lagoon.

The time at first did not hang so heavily on my hands. I was furnished with a sort of melancholy entertainment in watching the movements of the three ruffians upon the flat. I still tried to catch their conversation, though it was no longer needed to elucidate the transaction in which they were engaged.

In this I was unsuccessful as ever. Though at times talking with apparent earnestness, they kept to a low key, as if themselves fearful of being overheard. No wonder they should, considering the work in which they were engaged.

I became wearied watching them, and soon after lost sight of them altogether.

After the bales that had been rolled out upon the bank were treated as described, all three--Stinger having completed his task of purification--entered inside the ark, and for several hours I saw no more of them.

I could guess, however, how they were engaged. The bringing ashore only the odd bales had been to make room for operations inside, where I had no doubt that the whole cargo was receiving the Bradley brand.

The quickness with which they appeared to execute their work of unroping, stitching and retying, told that it was not the first time of their having been similarly employed; and the pieces of old canvas strewed about the place, and which I had noticed on my former visit to the island, were now recalled to my recollection. In that solitary spot more than one shipment of cotton had changed its plantation-mark.

I could now understand what had appeared to puzzle his acquaintances--how Mr. Nat Bradley had so rapidly prospered on his new plantation. His boast of being able to make two bales in Mississippi for one in Tennessee I could no longer look upon as an idle vaunt. Under my eyes was the explanation.

It was a long, tedious, terrible vigil. Astride the limb of a tree, hungry, athirst, smarting under the pulsations of a fevered wound, a prey to apprehensions that by some sinister chance I might be discovered in my place of concealment, I thought that the day would never come to an end. And even when it should end, what certainty had I of being able to make good my escape? The dug-out on which I was placing my dependence might be no longer there, or if it was, I might not succeed in starting it from its moorings? I might be detected in attempting to pass the flat, which lay between the canoe and the narrow creek that communicated with the river.

Besides these, there were other probable contingencies--scores of them--to distress and keep me in constant apprehension, and in this state I passed the remainder of the day.

Just as the twilight gloom was beginning to darken over the island, I saw something to cheer me. I saw the three men come forth out of the cavernous opening in the side of the ark, each carrying an armful of spoiled canvas, which I recognized as the cast sides of the cotton-bales. I saw them make these up into a huge bundle, load it with heavy mud, tie a rope round the whole mass, and fling it into the lagoon, where, like a stone, it sunk to the bottom! After this the odd bales were rolled aboard, the staging drawn in, the hatch-door shut to, and the huge ark yielding to a pair of oars passed slowly and silently from my sight!

As soon as sure that they were gone for good, I descended from the tree, and waiting till the darkness had come down, I groped my way toward the place where I remembered having seen the dug-out.

I was not disappointed. I found the old craft, still resting neglected upon the water, either not seen, or not cared for, by the pirates, who had passed away.

Getting quietly aboard, and arming myself with the paddle, I unloosed the fastening of twisted vines, and pushed on toward the river, which I reached without hearing or seeing any one.

Fortunately the night was a dark one, like that which preceded it. I was further favored by a thick fog that had come on after sunset.

Once out in the river I had no difficulty about the direction. The current guided me, and setting the stern of the canoe straight against it, I plied the paddle with all the strength I could command.

I took good care to dip the blade lightly, so as to make no noise in the water. The flat might still be within ear-shot. It might have been brought to for some purpose, alongside that island plantation, which I now knew to be the property of a pirate, and by the border of which I was now slowly feeling my way. The chill fog seemed to have quieted the night-chanters of the forest, and a slight sound could be heard far off. The stroke of the paddle might reach the ears of the pirates, and prompt them to follow me in their skiff that served as a tender to the cotton-boat.

I knew that they could easily overtake me, in which case I might count upon certain death. They would recognize the dug-out and know whence I had taken it.

For the first mile or so, I made but a snail's progress. With only one hand to work with, and it the wrong one, I had great difficulty in keeping the canoe stern on to the stream. Several times it came round broadside to the current, causing me to lose way before I could again get it headed in the right direction.

As I began to feel more confident that there was no pursuit, I also became more adroit in the management of the craft. Further up, too, the current was not so rapid, and I had less fear about dipping my oar-blade into the water.

Still I was not free from apprehension, and I moved on as silently as ever, at intervals suspending my stroke and listening to catch any sound from below.

Once I fancied I heard the plunge of oars close behind me, and in fear I gazed into the thick fog, thinking I should see the pursuing skiff. I listened intently for the plash of an oar-blade, or the murmur of human voices.

I heard neither. I must have mistaken the sound that had reached me. It may have been caused by an alligator floundering through the flood, or some drift-tree turned suddenly over by the current.

Though still necessarily slow, my progress improved as I got further away from that place of horror--the Devil's Island. But I was not easy in my mind, until by the earliest break of day, I saw before me an open spot on the bank, which I recognized as the landing of Henry Woodley's plantation. There was no house near it, no erection of any kind. Only some cords of firewood upon the bank, intended for the supply of such passing steamboats as chose to put in for it. It was part of the industrial resources of the plantation.

The house stood a full half-mile from the river's edge, screened from view by the cottonwood forest.

At that early hour, I did not expect to see any one at the landing. I hoped not, as I did not myself wish to be seen. I had begun to reflect on the future, more than the past, on the punishment of these murdering pirates, and the mode of bringing it about.

I knew that in such a lawless land, justice might not be so easily obtained, and that despite the proofs I had, stratagem would still have to be resorted to. At all events, it would be as well that none of the plantation negroes should know of my return until I had first placed myself in communication with their master.

With the view of making my approach unobserved, I clung close along the bank, and came to at some distance below the landing-place.

Drawing the dug-out up under some branches that overhung the bank, I made it secure, at the same time that it was concealed from view. I did not intend that the old craft should drift down-stream, and perhaps tell a tale to the pirates below.