At least that was what one of the boys had said to him!
Attracted by the strange lights, walking and creeping things now began gathering in the shadows at the rim of the circle of light. Once Clay caught sight of the soft, appealing eyes of a deer, and now and then the howls of a swamp cat came to their ears above the roaring of the flood. Great water snakes struck their heads above the surface and looked, red-eyed, and hostile, at the boys.
Swamp creatures with soft fur and frightened eyes crouched on fallen trees and scanned the deck as a possible refuge. To make the scene more desolate still, if possible, two round-eyed owls answered each other’s cries from a near-by cypress.
“Say,” Jule whispered to Clay, during a little lull in the rain, “there’s a man by that tree. I’ve been watching him a long time. Look at him!”
Clay followed the line of the pointing finger and laughed.
“Why, that’s a bear!” he shouted. “A swamp bear—one of the kind Teddy Roosevelt came down here to shoot when he was president! Let him alone and he’ll let us alone. They fight like devils when wounded or molested.”
The boys all agreed to let the bear alone, but Captain Joe and Teddy seemed to have notions of hospitality. The dog barked invitingly, and Teddy did a stunt of bear talk which brought the wanderer one tree nearer to the boat. He was now in the circle of light, and could get no nearer without swimming.
“He sees Teddy and wants to ask his advice!” Jule laughed.
At that moment Mose, noting that the boys were gazing fixedly in one direction, turned his eyes that way and saw the bear. The shriek he let out might, it seemed, have been heard in New Orleans, if the wind had been blowing in that direction!
“Ah’s a gone coon!” he wailed, after that one yell. “Ah’s a goin’ whar de good niggers go! Good bear! Good bear!” he added coaxingly.