"Lo!—my Heabenly Friend!" exclaimed Uncle Ephraim, falling back aghast, unaccustomed to the inflations of the currency of the Confederacy.
When the transformation was complete, he looked up from his knees, in which lowly posture he had assisted in drawing down the trousers over the boots, and smiled broadly in satisfaction.
"Dar now!" he exclaimed. "'Fore de Lawd, ye look plumb beau-some in dem comical cloes. Dey becomes ye! Dat they does—dough I ain't never see no such color as they got, 'dout 'twuz on a cow!"
He made up a bundle of the Confederate uniform and stowed it away on one of the ledges. "I don't want dem Yankees ter ever git no closer ter dis yere shed snake-skin dan dey is now."
But after the old man had been assisted to clamber out of "the vestibule of hell" by the stalwart arm of his young master and had disappeared among the firs, Julius made up the uniform into a compact bundle, packed it into the portmanteau, and, putting out the candle, sat down in the obscurities of the subterranean passage to await the enhanced opportunity for escape that the dark clouds, now gathering about the moon, might bring to the fortuitous collocation of circumstance.
When the sentries next heard any suggestion of Uncle Ephraim's presence, he was still singing on his return,—now and then humming and whistling as he came. He was approaching the house from the driveway, having indeed been to the river; he was bringing home a goodly mess of fish.
CHAPTER XI
An hour later there was a more significant landfall than the fate of these finny trophies. Few of the river craft kept their dates of arrival with certainty, and this was especially the case with the general packets. Though the water was high, the operations of the Confederates rendered the passage sometimes unsafe, sometimes impracticable. Now and again the Federal authorities pressed a boat into government service for a time and released it to its owners and its old traffic when the emergency was past. Therefore on this dull night, when no sign or news was received of the Calypso, overdue some ten hours, the wharf became deserted. Hardly a light showed on the river banks or along the spread of the stream, save indistinct gleams in the misty gloom where the picket boats kept up a ceaseless vigilant patrol. The gunboats, with a vaguely saurian suggestion lay with their noses in the mud. Here and there in allotted berths were the ordinary steamboats with their curiously flimsy aspect, as if constructed of white cardboard, silent, disgorged, asleep. The rafts, the coal-barges, the humble skiffs, and flatboats were all tied up for the night. The town had lapsed to silence and slumber as the hour waxed late. The great pale stream seemed as vacant as the great pale sky.