Dido. Miss Zoe got de pizen.
[Exit, L.
All. O! O!
[Exeunt, L.
[Scene II.]—Cane-brake Bayou.—Bank, C.—Triangle Fire, R. C.—Canoe, C.—M'Closky discovered asleep.
M'Closky. Burn, burn! blaze away! How the flames crack. I'm not guilty; would ye murder me? Cut, cut the rope—I choke—choke!—Ah! [Wakes.] Hello! where am I? Why, I was dreaming—curse it! I can never sleep now without dreaming. Hush! I thought I heard the sound of a paddle in the water. All night, as I fled through the cane-brake, I heard footsteps behind me. I lost them in the cedar swamp—again they haunted my path down the bayou, moving as I moved, resting when I rested—hush! there again!—no; it was only the wind over the canes. The sun is rising. I must launch my dug-out, and put for the bay, and in a few hours I shall be safe from pursuit on board of one of the coasting schooners that run from Galveston to Matagorda. In a little time this darned business will blow over, and I can show again. Hark! there's that noise again! If it was the ghost of that murdered boy haunting me! Well—I didn't mean to kill him, did I? Well, then, what has my all-cowardly heart got to skeer me so for? [Music.]
[Gets in canoe and rows off, L.—Wahnotee paddles canoe on, R.—gets out and finds trail—paddles off after him, L.]
[Scene III.]—Cedar Swamp.
Enter Scudder and Pete, L. 1. E.
Scud. Come on, Pete, we shan't reach the house before midday.