“They’re going to tie us up tighter. They’re so afraid of us! Do you think you can stand it?”
“Stan it? Yes, s’r. ’Tain’t nuffin. All same to an ole niggar like me. I knows ebery one ob dem. I’m Gasperojum myself.”
“Fellow-citizens,” said Bart, “and gentlemen of the Gaspereaux Valley, I appeal to your chivalry! Is it generous, or noble, or chivalrous, to bind the hands of my aged friend? I’ll give my word that he shan’t knock down more than a dozen of you, if you let him loose. Come now, aren’t there a dozen of you that will be willing to be knocked down for the sake of alleviating the woes of an aged, a virtuous, and an occasionally rheumatic African? Besides, you don’t know what he is. He’s not a common person. He’s a Grand Panjandrum.”
“O, you Panjer danjer yerself, an see how you like it!” growled the big Gaspereaugian, who felt some slight fear that Bart was making fun of him.
“See here,” said Bart; “since you’ve tied us up, hadn’t you better tie up that basket of provisions, too? If you haven’t got any cord, you may take what I have.”
This was received with roars of laughter, to which Bart listened with unaltered placidity.
Meanwhile, as Bart had been speaking, he had been trying his fetters, and found them not so tight but that he could work his hands free. His jests about their tying his hands made the Gaspereaugians ashamed to secure them more tightly. Some of them, indeed, were in favor even of untying him. But Bart had been hurriedly bound, and his hands were small, so that to slip them through the bonds was not a work of difficulty. He soon found out this, but kept his own counsel, and held his hands rigidly behind him, as though they were bound too tightly to be moved. As he spoke he looked all around watchfully, so as to see his chances of escape. To slip his hands was easy whenever he chose. Had it been himself alone that was concerned, he would have made a dash into the woods, and could have easily eluded pursuit. But he could not leave Solomon; and so he waited in the hope that some favorable juncture might arrive when he could free his companion also.
The Gaspereaugians now led them away across the brook that ran by the camp and took up their station on the other side, on that smooth, grass-grown slope which has already been mentioned. Bart and Solomon were put inside of a half-finished hut of spruce, which some of the boys had been building. Through the interstices of the branches they could see the camp of the “B. O. W. C.” perfectly well. It was not far away, and the Gaspereaugians were debating whether to go and pull it down now, or to wait until some more boys might come.
In the midst of this debate, Bruce came upon the scene, with his companions; and they, after looking hastily around, had found themselves in the presence of the invading host. There stood Bruce in full view of Bart and Solomon; his brows lowering darkly and menacingly, and a stern interrogation in his face, before which the Gaspereaugians as first seemed to quail.
“What do you want here, you fellows?” said Bruce, at last.