"Yes; I promised them I would return."
"Take some coffee and a kettle to boil it in; they will be glad of it, I should think."
"O Pomp! you know how to do good even to your enemies! What shall I say to them for you?"
"What I have to say to them I will say myself," said Pomp, taking his rifle in one hand, and the kettle in the other, to Cudjo's great wrath and disgust.
He set out with Penn immediately. They found the patriots reposing themselves about the roots of the forest trees, on the banks of a stream that came gurgling and plashing down the mountain side. Above them spread the beautiful green tops of maples, tinted with sunshine and softly rustling in the breeze. The curving banks formed here a little natural amphitheatre, carpeted with moss and old leaves, on which they sat or reclined, with their hats off and their guns at their sides.
A sentry posted on the edge of the forest brought in Penn and his companion. There was a stir of interest among the patriots, and some of them rose to their feet. Stackridge, Grudd, and two or three others cordially offered the negro their hands, and pledged him their gratitude and friendship. Pomp accepted these tokens of esteem in silence,—his countenance maintaining a somewhat haughty expression, his lips firm, his eyes kindling with a strange light.
Penn took the kettle, and proceeded, with Carl's help, to make a fire and prepare coffee for the company, intently listening the while to all that was said.
Jutting from one bank of the stream, which washed its base, was a huge, square block covered with dark-green moss. Upon this Pomp stepped, and rested his rifle upon it, and bared his massive and splendid head, and stood facing his auditors with a placid smile, under the canopy of leaves. There was not among them all so noble a figure of a man as he who stood upon the rock; and he seemed to have chosen this somewhat theatrical attitude in order to illustrate, by his own imposing personal presence, the words that rose to his lips.
"You will excuse me, gentlemen, if I cannot forget that I am talking with those who buy and sell men like me!"
Men like him! The suggestion seemed for a moment to strike the slave-owning patriots dumb with surprise and embarrassment.