The Mail Carrier

by Harry Castlemon

“O, there’s no use in saying anything about it, Bijah. He didn’t get any of the chickens?”

“No, sar, but he done tried mighty hard.”

“I would not care if he had got every chicken on the plantation,” said Bob, to himself, “for now I know that I am on the right track. Dan is camped closer to our house than he is to any other, or he would not have come to our hen-roost to steal chickens. He is well enough acquainted with the woods to know that the best hiding-place he can find is in one of those two gullies, and right there is where I shall look for him.”

Bob found the buck he had killed the night before just as he had left it, and when it had been placed on the mule’s back, old Bijah set out on his return to the plantation. As soon as he was out of sight among the trees Bob turned his face toward the ridge he had explored on the previous day, moving along so slowly and stealthily that he had hardly caused a leaf to rustle. When he reached the high ground he became still more cautious in his movements, and every now and then he would stop and listen, and look sharply in every direction.

Had a city youth been standing by Bob’s side on the top of the ridge, he would have thought that the young hunter had undertaken a hopeless task. The gullies, which ran on each side, were so densely covered with bushes that an army might have found concealment in them. More than that, they were two or three hundred yards wide at the bottom, and more than five miles long; and how could Bob hope to discover a single boy in that wilderness? By the same tell-tale sign that had revealed Godfrey’s presence to him—the smoke of a camp-fire. He discovered it before he had gone half a mile. It ascended in a thick cloud from a clump of bushes on the side of the opposite ridge, and Bob told himself that Dan had just started his fire, and was getting ready to cook his breakfast.

“He’ll not have broiled chicken, that’s certain,” said he, as he threw himself flat on the ground and began to work his way down the ridge in the direction of Dan’s camp. “He ran considerable risk when he tried to rob our hen-roost, and I don’t see what made him do it when game is so abundant. Probably he wanted a change.”

Bob crept through the bushes with surprising swiftness, and at the end of half an hour had approached near enough to Dan’s camp to take a good survey of it. Dan was at home, and he was engaged in a most pleasing occupation, if one might judge by the smiles which now and then overspread his face. He was sitting on a log, which he had rolled up in front of the fire, holding in one hand a small tin box, and in the other a package of greenbacks. He held the bills in all sorts of positions, so that he could see every side of them. He ran his fingers over them caressingly, spread them out on his knee, and then holding them out at arm’s length, turned his head on one side, and looked at them most lovingly. Bob, who saw it all from his place of concealment, was equally interested. He had never seen so large a package of greenbacks before, and his eyes fairly glistened while he looked at them.

“I had no idea that a hundred and sixty dollars would make such a big bundle as that,” thought Bob. “It must be all in small bills. That beggar looks nice with so much money in his possession, doesn’t he? But he shan’t have it much longer, for it is mine. I could have earned it if it hadn’t been for Don Gordon, and I’ll have it if I have to knock Dan down to get it.”

Fortunately Bob was saved the trouble of putting this desperate resolve into execution, for just then a gray squirrel mounted quickly into the branches of a hickory a few rods away and set up a shrill bark. Dan heard him, and Bob judged by his actions that he had not yet had his breakfast. This was the fact. Dan had been so excited by the success that had attended the plans he had laid for securing the whole of David’s money, and so anxious to get safely out of his father’s reach and find a secure hiding-place, that he could not take time to hunt up anything to eat. He had not had a mouthful for the last twenty-four hours. He did not even know that he was hungry; but he found it out during the previous night, and his raid on Mr. Owens’s hen-roost had been undertaken because he thought he could not possibly go without something to eat until the day broke and the squirrels began to stir about.

When Dan heard the barking of the squirrel he placed the money quickly in the box, put on the cover, and thrusting it under the log on which he was sitting, hastily drew a few leaves over it to conceal it. This done he picked up his rifle which lay on the ground near him, arose from his seat, and with noiseless footsteps stole off through the bushes in the direction from which the barking of the squirrel sounded. He was out of sight in a few seconds, and this was the time for Bob, who crept quickly out of his concealment, and making a wide circuit around the camp, came up behind the log on which Dan had been sitting. There he paused a moment and listened to make sure that Dan was still working his way toward the squirrel, and then reaching over the log he ran his hand through the leaves which the wind had heaped against it, until his fingers came in contact with the box. With eager haste he seized it, and when he felt it fairly in his grasp his heart seemed to stop beating, so elated and excited was he. He held it with a firm grasp, as if he feared that it might somehow get away from him, and jumping quickly to his feet, turned his back on the camp and made off. For a few minutes he was very cautious in his movements; and then, believing that Dan was too far away to hear any noise he might make, he broke into a run. He went at his best speed, holding a straight course for home, until the report of a rifle echoing through the woods behind him caused him to slacken his pace to a rapid walk.