This was the way Godfrey talked; but had he acted out his feelings, he would have fallen upon Dan with the cowhide the moment they reached the cabin.
The three miles that lay between the landing and the Evans plantation being accomplished, Godfrey, with the air of a man who had done a day’s work with which he was perfectly satisfied, seated himself on a bench beside the door, preparatory to indulging in a pipeful of the store tobacco which had come into his possession so unexpectedly; while Dan proceeded to the corn-crib behind the house, and harnessed an old and very infirm mule to a rickety wagon, intending to return to the landing and bring home the quarter of beef that had fallen to his lot. He went about his task in that peculiar and indescribable way a boy has of doing things when he has something in view besides the work in hand. His movements were stealthy, and he cast frequent and furtive glances around him, as if he were afraid of being caught in some act that would bring him certain and speedy punishment.
Once or twice he moved quickly to the cabin and looked around the corner, to make sure that his father was still seated where he had left him. He always found him there. He never seemed to have changed his position. He sat with his legs stretched out before him, his hands thrust deep into his pockets, his head bowed, his eyes closed and his beloved pipe tightly clenched between his teeth. He was asleep; and Dan, having made sure of this, quickly returned to the corn-crib and halted under a shed which was built on one side of it. This shed was used to shelter the wagon, the few farming implements Godfrey possessed, and also the harness, which, when not in use, was kept hung up on a wooden pin driven into one of the logs of which the corn-crib was built. Dan came to a stop under this pin, and after looking all around again to make sure that there was no one watching him, he seized it with both hands, and after working it backward and forward a few times, finally pulled it out.
Looking into the hole, as if to satisfy himself that something he had previously placed there was safe, Dan drew a roll of bills out of his pocket, and, after running his eye over them to make sure that they were all there, thrust them into the hole, and with one quick blow with his hand drove the pin back to its place. This done, he jumped into the wagon, picked up the knotted lines, and as he drove around the corner of the cabin, took care to notice his father’s position. Godfrey was still asleep—there could be no doubt about that. His pipe was twisted about in his mouth, until the bowl pointed downward, his head was thrown over on one side, and as Dan looked at him, he told himself that he was disposed of for two long hours, at least. Yet so suspicious was he, that he did not neglect to turn and look at him every now and then as long as he remained in sight of the cabin.
“He’s thar yet, an’ I reckon I’ve fixed things all right,” thought Dan, with a chuckle denoting intense satisfaction. “He’s been kinder snoopin’ around ever since he found out I had that money, an’ I was afeared that mebbe he’d smell out somethin’. He thinks I don’t know it, but I’ve seed him more’n once sarchin’ my pockets arter I went to bed, an’ he thought I was asleep. He was a lookin’ fur gun caps, an’ things he couldn’t buy hisself. I reckon he hain’t made much outen me since I found that hidin’ place fur my money an’ sich plunder. ’Tain’t safe to trust pop no further nor a feller can see him.”
With these sage reflections, Dan drove on toward the landing.
CHAPTER V.
GODFREY FINDS SOMETHING.
WHEN Dan drove around the corner of the cabin, the slumbering Godfrey, without changing his position, opened one of his eyes, but quickly closed it again as Dan turned about in his wagon to look at him. Presently he opened it again, and kept it open until Dan once more turned to look at him; and the farther the wagon left the house behind, the oftener the eye was opened, and the longer it remained open. When the wagon and its driver had disappeared around a bend in the road, Godfrey opened both eyes, straightened up, stretching his arms and yawning as if he had just awakened out of a sound sleep, turned his pipe about in his mouth, and with an expression of great satisfaction on his face, arose and went around the corner of the house toward the corn-crib. He walked straight to the shed that stood beside it, and placing his hand on the same pin that Dan had removed but a few minutes before, pulled it out and looked into the opening.