“Go off about your business, Jim,” said Duke. “Haven’t you sense enough to see that the boy has had the ague? If he was well, he would throw you or any other young Indian in the camp. Go away now, I tell you, or I’ll take hold of you; and if I do, I will put you down a little quicker than lightning.”
“Isn’t he a splendid-looking fellow?” said Mark, gazing admiringly at the young savage’s supple form, which, cold as the day was, was stripped to the waist. “Look at the muscles on his arms! I believe I’ll try him just one round.”
“Don’t do it, Mark,” I interposed.
“Well, if you say so, Joe, I won’t; but I should really like to take a little of that conceit out of him. I’ll soon be up to my regular wrestling weight,” he added, addressing himself to the Indian, “and then I will see what you are made of.”
“Ugh!” grunted Jim. “I wait for you.”
We spent an hour walking about the camp, and then returned to the house. The jubilee was kept up all night, and we went to sleep with those wild Indian whoops ringing in our ears. To me there was something almost unearthly in the sound, and I thought I could imagine how our early settlers felt when they were aroused from their sleep at dead of night by just such yells uttered by hostile red men.
The next day our fellows accompanied some of the settlers on a deer-hunt—all except Mark, who, being too weak to ride all day on horse-back, remained at home with his hounds for company; and, for want of something better to do, assisted the plantation blacksmith at his work by blowing the bellows for him.
The Indians were quiet all the morning, no doubt making up for the sleep they had lost the night before, but about eleven o’clock they began their dancing and shouting again. After that, Mark did not perform his part of the work very well, for his attention was fully occupied by the sounds that came from the camp.
Finally the horn was blown for dinner, and Mark started toward the house. Just as he was passing through the gate that led into the garden, he was startled by a loud yell, which was followed by a great commotion in the kitchen, and the next moment out came mother and half a dozen young lady visitors.
A very fat negro woman brought up the rear, carrying in her hand a platter of roast beef, which she was too badly frightened to put down, and the screams that saluted Mark’s ears were almost as loud and unearthly as those which came from the Indian camp. He did not like the look of things, but, being a resolute fellow, he determined to find out what was going on in the house. He had two friends upon whom he could rely in any emergency, and, with a word to them, he was off like a shot.