"My heart bleeds for this poor girl," the hostess said. "They say your son spirits negroes North. Mr. Clark says so. I do not ask you if it is true, but, as one mother to another, I give you this girl. She is too white to be sold. She looks like a dead child of mine."
"Bill is not due home till sunset. If she is alive by that time, he has just time to drive her to Mr. Zeke Hunn's vessel at the mouth of the creek, which lies there every trip one hour—"
"To let runaways come aboard?"
"I have never been accused of helping them, Mrs. Clark."
The trader's wife slipped a bank-bill into the colored woman's hand.
"Lend to the Lord!" she said. "I depend upon you to save us the sin of selling this girl."
There came to the little black house that lurked by the woods two riding-horses, and stopped at the stile.
"Wait here!" said the voice of Devil Jim Clark. "Will you take her if she is still delirious?"
"Bingavast! Why not? I'm delirious myself, Jim, fur it's my wedding-night. I'll rest her at Punch Hall."