“LUCIEN SAW HIM AND RUSHED TOWARD HIM.”
“Me and sister started out to hunt you,” said Lucien, whimpering a little, now that he had nothing to whimper for, “and I think you are mighty mean to run off and leave us all at home.”
“Now you talkin’, honey,” said Daddy Jake, laughing in his old fashion. “I boun’ I’m de meanes’ ole nigger in de Nunited State. Yit, ef I’d ’a’ know’d you wuz gwine ter foller me up so close, I’d ’a’ fotch you wid me, dat I would! An’ dar’s little Missy,” he exclaimed, leaning over the little girl, “an’ she’s a-sleepin’ des ez natchul ez ef she wuz in her bed at home. What I tell you-all?” he went on, turning to a group of negroes that had followed him,—Randall, Cupid, Isaiah, and others,—“What I tell you-all? Ain’t I done bin’ an’ gone an’ tole you dat deze chillun wuz de out-doin’est chillun on de top-side er de roun’ worl’?”
The negroes—runaways all—laughed and looked pleased, and Crazy Sue fairly danced. They made so much fuss that they woke Lillian, and when she saw Daddy Jake she gave one little cry and leaped in his arms. This made Crazy Sue dance again, and she would have kept it up for a long time, but Randall suggested to Daddy Jake that the boat ought to be hauled ashore and hidden in the bushes. Crazy Sue stayed with the children while the negro men went after the boat. They hauled it up the bank by the chain, and then they lifted and carried it several hundred yards away from the river, and hid it in the thick bushes and grass.
“Now,” said Daddy Jake, when they had returned to where they left the children, “we got ter git away f’um yer. Dey ain’t no tellin’ w’at gwine ter happen. Ef deze yer chillun kin slip up on us dis away w’at kin a grown man do?”
The old man intended this as a joke, but the others took him at his word, and were moving off. “Wait!” he exclaimed. “De chillun bleeze ter go whar I go. Sue, you pick up little Missy dar, an’ I’ll play hoss fer dish yer chap.”
Crazy Sue lifted Lillian in her arms, Daddy Jake stooped so that Lucien could climb up on his back, and then all took up their march for the middle of Hudson’s cane-brake. Randall brought up the rear in order, as he said, to “stop up de holes.”
It was a narrow, slippery, and winding path in which the negroes trod—a path that a white man would have found difficult to follow. It seemed to lead in all directions; but, finally, it stopped on a knoll high and dry above the surrounding swamp. A fire was burning brightly, and the smell of frying meat was in the air. On this knoll the runaway negroes had made their camp, and for safety they could not have selected a better place.
It was not long before Crazy Sue had warmed some breakfast for the children. The negroes had brought the food they found in the boat, and Crazy Sue put some of the biscuits in a tin bucket, hung the bucket on a stick, and held it over the fire. Then she gave them some bacon that had been broiled on a stone, and altogether they made a hearty breakfast.