With the chill and the shock, his teeth chattered so that he could not tell them about the poor darky, try as he would.
So the two Kentucky officers went ashore, each grumbling to the other about some "miscount." And Doby was hurried to his own flatboat home, standing at the wharf, where a warm welcome and a cozy supper were given to them and their guest, Simon Kenton, by Doby's waiting mother.
Then, and not till then, did Doby's father indulge in laughter long and loud. But Kenton, with a merry twinkle, merely asked, "Tell us, son, how much was on purpose and how much just happened so."
His father added, "You managed to get all the attention of the boat at the time the runaway did not want it for himself."
Doby was still shuddering with horror at the fate of the black, and he was ready to faint as he gasped, "The darky is drownded!"
"Don't think it," cried Mr. Holman. "He swam underwater with the current, came up clear, took a big breath, dived toward the shore, and swam away perfectly safe. I saw him climb into the bushes on shore. He will roll in somebody's hay until his dress is dry; then travel north to-night, watching for the Quakers to pick him up."
"The Society of Friends is working out a regular plan for helpin' runaways that is liable to grow into a big thing one of these days," was Simon Kenton's prophecy.
When the first Quaker who felt a throb of pity for the wretched runaway cowering for mercy at his feet, resolved to be a true Friend to the unfortunate, by defying man's law of property and obeying God's law of mercy, he surveyed in his mind the earliest routes for the underground railway, as he considered to which Friend farther north he should send this fugitive.
The underground railway was never built of wooden cross-ties nor of steel rails. Its right of way was in the hearts of those who guarded the secret paths and the hidden shelters through which the slaves passed to the land of their hopes.