“‘You won’t shoot him?’ she demanded, turning sharply around.”
They heard the neigh of a horse, over in the road, and an answering call from Rhoda’s mare, which she had left tied to the fence. “Are we nearly there?” asked the mulatto.
The path sloped downward again and she sped onward, her thoughts flashing, lightning like, across her mind. If the slaves really did not want freedom, if they were happy and contented in slavery, why was this man taking such desperate chances? Perhaps he was fleeing from a master as cruel as Uncle Tom’s. She would ask him—at last she could find out the truth from one of those who alone knew what was the truth.
Rhoda stopped beside a thick tangle of hazel bushes that grew against the face of a sharp rise of the hill.
“Here it is,” she said. “Go around to the other side of this thicket and between the bushes and the hill just a little ways in, you’ll see the opening into the cave. It’s perfectly safe—only children ever go there.”
“Thank you, miss, thank you!” he breathed as he hurried past her. Then he paused an instant and half turned toward her again. “You’d better get out of harm’s way, quick! If Jeff Delavan did see me just now he won’t stop till he finds me, if he has to burn the woods down to do it! And I won’t be taken!”
He rushed on around the thicket and did not see how she suddenly stiffened and the color faded from her face, leaving it white to the lips.
“Jeff Delavan!” she repeated. “Is he your master?”
The runaway was peering into the mouth of the cave, making sure that the way was clear, but at the amazed tone of her question he straightened up, threw back his head and his voice was tense with bitterness: