Chapter XI: Fire-Faces on the Island

"What are they squatting there watching the boat for?" queried Jule, as the prow light fell full on the group of negroes on the island. "They don't look good to me!"

"If we keep away from them," Case suggested, "and don't try to stare them out of countenance, they'll probably keep away from us. They do look fierce, though!"

While the boys discussed the matter the negroes moved away from the shore of the island, where they were under the boat lights, and secreted themselves behind a patch of willows which fringed the "tow-head," for the place where they were was little else.

"I don't believe they have any idea of letting us alone, if they can manage to get on board the _Rambler_," Clay declared. "I have often read that lawless negroes and whites are alike alert for plunder during flood seasons, and it is floating goods those fellows are after, unless I am much mistaken. We'll have to keep a sharp watch to-night."

"Wouldn't it be wiser to drive them away?" asked Alex., with one of his grins.

"We have no right to drive them away," Case suggested. "We may get into trouble if we try it. I'll watch half the night and not mind it at all."

Alex. nudged Jule in the side and whispered in his ear for a moment.

"Jule and I will watch the first half," he then said. "Perhaps they will go off home by midnight, and Case won't have to watch at all."

"Alex.," Clay exclaimed, "you've got some mischief in your mind. Heretofore you've come out of your scrapes with whole bones, but sometime you'll get into serious trouble if you don't stop running out nights. I strongly advise you to let those levee negroes alone! You go to bed early, and I'll watch the boat!"

"Who's got mischief in the mind?" grinned Alex. "I guess I can stay up until midnight without gettin' into trouble! You see if I don't make the dandy watchman to-night! When it comes to keeping guard, I'm the candy boy!"

"You usually manage to get into trouble when you are left alone!" laughed Clay.

"If I can't be good to-night," grinned Alex., "I'll be careful."

Nothing more was seen of the negroes at that time, although the boys were satisfied that they were still on the island, as no boat had been seen to leave it.

After a time Clay, Case and Mose went to bed, leaving Alex., Jule, Captain Joe, and Teddy on deck. The dog seemed particularly wide awake, moving about as if he scented danger, while the cub sat looking toward the island with twitching nostrils.

"Seems as if the dog and the cub know there's something coming off here to-night," Jule remarked, as Captain Joe put his paw on the gunwale and sniffed the air. "Do you really think they have a way of discovering approaching peril which human beings have not? Captain Joe certainly looks as if he saw something unpleasant coming."

"I often think dogs have an instinct which warns them of danger," Alex. replied.

"Well," Jule went on, "we'll soon see what comes of the signals of danger he is now handing out to us! Whatever he sees or senses is on that island."

The boys watched for a long time, but there came no sounds of life from the island.

"You're like the dog," Jule said to Alex., presently. "You are getting ready for a break of some sort! Suppose you loosen up and tell me what it is?"

"You remember that night on the Amazon, when we scared the life out of a couple of renegade Englishmen and a native Indian?" asked Alex.

"Sure I do!" was the reply. "That was the funniest ever!"

"Well," Alex. explained, "I'm goin' to try something like that on these negroes."

"Better let 'em alone!" advised Jule. "They are wise to tricks!"

"Shucks!" Alex. laughed. "I'll have them walking on their heads, and walking the water at that. I wish I had a boat, so I wouldn't have to swim to the island!"

"We've lost a rowboat every trip!" Jule exclaimed. "I wonder why we didn't pick the one we had off the raft and fix it up. It wasn't badly smashed."

"We may find it yet," Alex. said, hopefully. "We have come down just a little faster than the current, and so it is probably behind us. When it comes down we'll get it and make it as good as new."

"Yes, when we get it!" laughed Jule. "There's a thousand people along the island beaches and mainland levees watching for boats! Just like these negroes are watching for anything at all that seems worth picking out of the water!"

"It won't do any harm to keep a lookout for it," Alex. decided. "Now," he added, turning out the lights and throwing off his coat, "do you want to go to the shore with me? If you will go I'll show you a race that will beat anything you ever saw."

"And leave the boat alone?" demanded Jule. "I should say not. I'll remain here and see that your retreat is properly covered. You'll want some one here to hold a gun on the negroes you seem determined to stir up."

"Now don't get a grouch on," pleaded Alex. "I'm doing this purely in the interest of science! I want to see how far the emancipation proclamation has relieved the negroes of the south from the old-time superstitions of the race! Not to put too fine a point upon it, kid, I want to see what a good healthy ghost will do to a lot of river thieves! Do you get me?"

"Going to play ghost, are you," laughed Jule. "Then I'll be a ghost, too!"

Alex. listened at the cabin door for a moment, but heard no sounds indicating the lack of sleep on the inside. Then he crept in, fumbled around in the darkness until he found two old bathing suits and a square package which smelled of sulphur.

"Now," he explained to Jule, as he came out, "we'll put on these bathing suits, so as to have dry clothes ready when we return from the island! You take a part of the matches, for we may become separated in the thicket. We won't do the Mephisto act until we get to the island, then rub the sulphur on thick--on your hands and face."

"I guess I know how!" Jule remonstrated.

The boys placed their clothing in two piles on the deck and donned the bathing suits--much to the wonder of Captain Joe, who wrinkled his nose and looked suspiciously at the boys. His remarks on the subject of bathing in a swift river in the night time were not in favor of the experiment. However, he crouched down by Alex.'s feet and expressed himself as willing to share in the doubtful expedition.

"When we get into the willows," Alex. explained, "I'll let out a yell which will put Mose's efforts in that direction away to the bad! Then you run at them on the right and I'll close in on the left, and we'll see a race that will put the Greek events out on a blind siding with fires banked. When you are ready, drop in and swim for the bunch of willows straight ahead. Swim slow and don't make any noise."

The boys left the dark deck of the _Rambler_ and entered the water. There was little current where the boat lay, and they had no difficulty in making the willows pointed out by the promoter of the midnight excursion. The lights of Memphis made a faint haze in the sky to the south. The wash of the river drowned all individual noises. In the distance the caving of a bank sent down a heavy sound.

Believing that they had left the boat without awakening any of the sleepers and landed on the island without attracting the attention of the negroes, the boys crouched down in a thicket and listened.

The moon, which would set about midnight, was low down in the west, and gave a fitful light at rare intervals. There was a heavy mass of thunderheads in the sky, and few stars showed through. There were no indications of a light or fire on the island.

The boys, however, were much mistaken in their understanding of the situation. When they dropped off the deck of the _Rambler_, Clay poked his head out of the cabin and watched them as far as the darkness would permit. Then he returned to the cabin, put on a bathing suit and took a square box from the cupboard.

The box contained the reserve weapons and flashlights of the party and was waterproof. With this in his hand, and leaving Captain Joe on guard, with strict orders not to leave the deck, he entered the water and swam toward the shore, turning away from the bunch of willows where the two boys had landed.

Of course he did not know that Alex. and Jule had left the water there, but it seemed to him that they would naturally select the nearest point as their landing place. Once on shore he sat down to await developments.

He was certain that Alex. and Jule had entered upon a dangerous expedition. The river negroes of the south are by no means as superstitious as is generally believed, and Clay knew it. He doubted if they would run far at sight of a face blazing with sulphur. It was his opinion that the boys would be the ones to start the race!

The negroes were sure to be armed, and they might be drunk, in which case they would not be likely to permit the outer spirits to bluff the inner spirits! Besides, they might have valuable plunder on the island, and some would be brave enough to remain and fight for it.

Of course, if Clay had gravely asked the boys to give over their proposed joy visit to the island, they would undoubtedly have done so, but he did not care to do that. His thought was that he ought not to attempt to control the actions of he boys, as they all stood equal on the trip, no one having authority over the others.

Besides, if the truth must be told, Clay, himself, was not averse to a little excitement! In addition, he was anxious to know what was doing on the island, and why the negroes were assembled there.

Another feature of the situation was that a watcher on the beach saw all three forms in the water as they left the boat! When the lads landed, Alex. and Jule at the clump of willows and Clay farther to the west, this watcher lost no time in communicating with his fellows in their rough-and-ready camp near the center of the little "tow-head."

The noise made by the negroes in getting ready to meet whatever attack might be made upon them gave the location of their camp to Clay, and he pressed as close to it as it was possible for him to do without advancing into the open, where he might have been seen during any moment of moonlight.

It was a chill night, and there was a wind blowing from the west which seemed to cut into his bones, but Clay sat down not far from the camp and awaited the opening of the drama! He could hear the campers moving about, but could not distinguish the words spoken. The moon sank out of sight for good before any movement was made.

Then Clay saw a figure fit to frighten the most courageous leave the fringe of willows and advance deliberately toward the center of the island. He had hard work to make himself understand that the thing he saw was only one of the boys. If the very Old Scratch himself had set foot on the "tow-head" he could not have presented a more sinister appearance. Clay watched the advance of the figure with bated breath.

In a second after the figure appeared, flaming of face and pointing hands, with a great cross of fire on what appeared to be a naked breast, a long, wavering cry went up from the camp, and then there came a rush of feet. Clay could not tell at first which way the feet were going, but a moment convinced him that they were putting a swift distance between the camp and the devil-figure approaching.

When a second figure, marked like the first, appeared the shrieks of alarm, the running of frightened feet, were drowned by the commands of a bull-like voice to stop the panic-stricken flight and use revolver and knife!