The boy shot away like a flash, while Hugh turned and looked at Brutus again; for now he knew that he had seen him over at the Pangborn mansion.
CHAPTER XVII
LITTLE BRUTUS AND HIS "COLLECTION"
It was not long before they discovered a woman running like mad toward the spot. Of course this was no other than Sarah, whose heart had been chilled by the news fetched by Adolphus Smith, the truth being considerably garbled, it is to be feared.
She arrived panting, and with her eyes full of horror, as though she fully expected to find her darling Brutus lying there all wet and cold.
Upon discovering the shrinking little form, she seized him in her arms, and dropping to the ground began rocking back and forth as she hugged him tight, meanwhile covering his ebony little face with motherly kisses.
"Hebben be praised, I ain't done lost my Brutus after all. Dat 'Dolphus he skeered me nigh to death wif his stuttering story as how my chile be'n in de mill-pond. What's all dis row about, anyhow? I hopes none o' you folks done play a joke on me, dat's right. It'd be de wustest thing yuh eber done, let me tells yuh."
The parson thereupon proceeded to tell her the real facts. Sarah hugged the rescued boy some more, and then on hearing how his life had been saved by the actions of two white boys, she looked up at Hugh and Thad.
"Why, it am de young Morgan boy, glory, if it ain't!" she ejaculated, and Hugh was a little afraid the good woman, in her gratitude, might want to transfer her embraces from Brutus to him, so he held out his hand, with one of his smiles, saying: