“You must be dreaming!” exclaimed Ned.
“Them’s the very same words I axed myself when I first see Tom comin’ t’wards me on his mu-el, kase I couldn’t b’lieve it was him till I listened to him talk; then I knowed it was Tom, for almost the first thing he said was meanness. He’s made it up with some of the Home Guards at Camp Pinckney.”
“Gracious!” cried Ned, becoming frightened. “They’re the worst lot of ruffians in the world. They shoot their prisoners.”
“So I’ve heerd tell,” said Lambert indifferently. “Well, them’s the fine chaps that Tom has made it up with to burn old man Gray’s cotton, an’ he wanted to know if I would sorter guide them to the place where it was, an’ I told him I wouldn’t, kase I aint going to take no chances on bein’ tooken to that camp. I’m scared of them Pearl River chaps.”
“You’d better be, for they would just as soon shoot you as anybody else, simply to keep their hands in. Now, how are we going to keep them from finding that cotton?”
“That’s the very thing that’s been a-pesterin’ of me ever since Tom spoke to me about it,” answered Lambert.
“If you don’t act as their guide they can easily find somebody else who will do it rather than be shot,” said Ned in an anxious tone. “I don’t believe Rodney has enjoyed a night’s sound sleep since he had his first talk with the Federal provost marshal at Baton Rouge. But he is bound to save his father’s property if he can, and you must do all in your power to help him.”
“Do you remember what you said on the night you rid up to my door an’ warned me that the citizens allowed to hang me for what I done down the river?” replied Lambert. “You said that old man Gray was tryin’ to talk ’em out of it by tellin’ ’em that if they done it they would be sorry in the mornin’, didn’t you? Well, I don’t forget a man who does me a good turn any more’n I forget one who does me a mean one.” And when he said this he scowled fiercely, for he was thinking of Tom Randolph.
“Well, have you any plan in your head?” continued Ned.
“Nary plan. I jest rid down to get some good tobacker an’ to tell you to warn Rodney to look out for breakers. What’s the reason you don’t want me to go nigh his house for a few days?”