His mind seemed to go on sudden little journeys, and to show him pictures of the wandering life Hi described, and of his own safe home life. Then the faces and the language of those men and women with the show helped him to understand. He began to feel very sorry for Hi.
“I know a man—Rath Rutherford his name is—who’s going around the mountain getting folks to go down and work in the cotton mills at Lee,” he said after a time. “He’d take me if my folks would let me go, and I reckon he’d take you if you wanted.”
“I never could get away from my uncle—unless I ran away.”
“And hid,” suggested Jim.
“There ain’t nobody to stand by me.”
“Yes there is too! I’ll stand by you—sure I will.”
“I ran away once and got caught and lambasted for it.”
“You wouldn’t get caught if I hid you,” declared Jim. “Besides, you and me could fight.”
They fell to planning what they would do if they were hidden and the people came to get them, and they had to fight; or what would happen if they came across a wildcat or a rattlesnake. They got very well acquainted, and were almost ready to start off together to “take care of themselves,” as Hi put it, when a horn was blown from somewhere far above their heads.
“That’s for me,” cried Jim. “Come, we must go,” and forgetting all about his plan for running away, he began scrambling up the rocks toward home.