"That's the great bend," said Scipio, "we shall take an hour to get round it, and yet 'tis but a couple of hundred yards across."
"Stretch out, you two!" cried Turner; "we must make haste, and leave this little watercourse, with its high, uncomfortable, overgrown banks, behind us. I shan't feel myself in safety, till we're on the other side of the Mississippi."
The men, thenceforward, observed a deep silence; Bertha endeavoured with all her power to raise herself, and looked up entreatingly at the dark man, who sat beside her, with the helm in his hand; but he, guessing well enough that she wanted to speak to him, shook his head, smiling, and whispered, in a low voice—
"No, my dear, you mustn't make any use of your pretty lips yet—the danger is too great, here; besides, begging, or praying, or offering ransom, or whatever else those tricks and evasions may be called, would be unavailing.—You are mine!"—and he hissed the word out so softly, between his teeth, that it escaped even Normann's ear: "thou art mine, and no devil shall tear thee from me!"
The boat was now approaching the spot where the curve of the stream terminated, and where it almost resumed its former course. At this point, by reason of the great bend which it made to the right, the rivulet had washed away nearly the whole of the lower part of the left bank, so that the upper stratum of earth, in many places, overhung like a roof, and could only have been retained in its position by the roots of willows, and swamp maples.
The boat, too, had been drifted by the current towards the outer side of the bend in the river, and Turner was just about to keep her head more towards mid-channel, in order to avoid the danger of getting foul of, and, perhaps, overturned by the tree stems which projected from the vicinity of the bank, when the mulatto suddenly held up his hand, and ceased rowing; Dr. Normann instantly followed his example, and the former stood up from his seat, and listened, holding his hands in the form of a funnel to his ear in the direction of the left bank.
"Do you hear anything?" asked Turner.
The mulatto made a sign with his hand to be quiet, but remained in his former attitude.
The boat still shot quickly forward, although no longer urged on by the oars.