To emphasize his declaration, he stamped with his foot; the head of the cask flew in, and down went orator, cask, and all, in a fashion rendered all the more ridiculous by the climax of oratory it illustrated.
"Just so sure will your hollow and inhuman schemes fail from under your feet!" exclaimed Mr. Villars, as soon as he learned what had happened. "So surely and so suddenly will you fall."
This incident occurred as Toby's flogging was about to begin in earnest. Virginia had instinctively covered her eyes to shut out the terrible sight, her ears to shut out the sounds of the beating and the poor old fellow's groans. Luckily, Silas had fallen partly in the barrel, and partly across the sharp edge of it, and being too tipsy to help himself, had been seriously hurt, and was now helpless. The ruffians hastened to extricate him, and raise him up. Carl, who, with an open knife concealed in his sleeve, had been waiting for an opportunity, darted at the tree, cut the negro's bonds in a twinkling, and set him free.
Both took to their heels without an instant's delay. But the trick was discovered. They were pursued immediately. Carl was lively on his legs, as we know; but poor old Toby, never a good runner, and now stiff and decrepit with age, was no match even for the slowest of their pursuers.
They ran straight into the orchard, hoping to lose themselves among the shadows. The glare of the burning wood-pile flickered but faintly and unsteadily among the trees. Carl might easily have escaped; but he thought only of Toby, and kept faithfully at his side, assisting him, urging him. A fence was near—if they could only reach that! But Toby was wheezing terribly, and the hand of the foremost ruffian was already extended to seize him.
"Jump the vence over!" was Carl's parting injunction to the old negro, who made a last desperate effort to accomplish the feat; while Carl, turning sharp about, tripped the foot of him of the extended hand, and sent him headlong. The second pursuer he grappled, and both rolled upon the ground together.
Favored by this diversion, Toby reached the fence, climbed it, and without looking how, he leaped, jumped down upon—a human figure, stretched there upon the ground!
Notwithstanding his own danger, Toby thought of his patient, and stopped.
"Is it you, massa?"
The man rose slowly to his feet. It was not Penn; it was, on the contrary, the worst of Penn's enemies, who had stationed himself here, in order to observe, unseen, and from a safe distance, the operations of Silas Ropes and his band of patriots.