SCENE XV.
Wilkins's Woods.
LIKE ALL DOGS IN FICTION THE FAITHFUL RAGS GUIDES MISS VILDA TO HIS LITTLE MASTER.
Samantha ran out to the barn to hold the lantern and see that Jabe didn't go to sleep while he was harnessing Maria. But he seemed unusually "spry" for him, although he was conducting himself in a somewhat strange and unusual manner. His loose figure shook from time to time, as with severe chills; he seemed too weak to hold up the shafts, and so he finally dropped them and hung round Maria's neck in a sort of mild, speechless convulsion.
"What under the canopy ails you, Jabe Slocum?" asked Samantha. "I s'pose it's one o' them everlastin' old addled jokes o' yourn you're tryin' to hatch out, but it's a poor time to be jokin' now. What's the matter with you?"
"'Ask me no questions 'n' I'll tell you no lies,' is an awful good motto," chuckled Jabe, with a new explosion of mirth that stretched his mouth to an alarming extent. "Oh, there, I can't hold in 'nother minute. I shall bust if I don' tell somebody! Set down on that nail kag, Samanthy, 'n' I'll let you hev a leetle slice o' this joke—if you'll keep it to yourself. You see I know—'bout—whar—to look—for this here—runaway!"
"You hev n't got him stowed away anywheres, hev you? If you hev, it'll be the last joke you'll play on Vildy Cummins, I can tell you that much, Jabe Slocum."
"No, I hain't stowed him away, but I can tell putty nigh whar he's stowed hisself away, and I'm ready to die a-laffin' to see how it's all turned out jest as I suspicioned 't would. You see, Samanthy Ann, I thought 'bout a week ago 't would be well enough to kind o' create a demand for the young ones so 't they'd hev some kind of a market value, and so I got Elder Southwick 'n' Aunt Hitty kind o' started on that tack, 'n' it worked out slick as a whistle, tho' they didn't know I was usin' of 'em as innercent instruments, and Aunt Hitty don't need much encouragement to talk; it's a heap easier for her to drizzle 'n it is to hold up! Well, I've ben surmisin' for a week that the boy meant to run away, and to-day I was dead sure of it; for he come to me this afternoon, when I was restin' a spell on account o' the hot sun, and he was awful low-sperrited, 'n' he asked me every namable kind of a question you ever hearn tell of, and all so simple-minded that I jest turned him inside out 'thout his knowin' what I was doin'. Well, when I found out what he was up to I could 'a' stopped him then 'n' there, tho' I don' know 's I would anyhow, for I shouldn't like livin' in a 'sylum any better 'n he doos; but thinks I to myself, thinks I, I'd better let him run away, jest as he's a plannin',—and why? Cause it'll show what kind o' stuff he's made of, and that he ain't no beggar layin' roun' whar he ain't wanted, but a self-respectin' boy that's wuth lookin' after. And thinks I, Samanthy, 'n' I know the wuth of him a'ready, but there's them that hain't waked up to it yit, namely, Miss Vildy Trypheny Cummins; and as Miss Vildy Trypheny Cummins is that kind o' cattle that can't be drove, but hez to be kind o' coaxed along, mebbe this runnin'-away bizness 'll be the thing that'll fetch her roun' to our way o' thinkin'. Now I wouldn't deceive nobody for a farm down East with a pig on it, but thinks I, there ain't no deceivin' 'bout this. He don' know I know he's goin' to run away, so he's all square; and he never told me nothin' 'bout his plans, so I'm all square; and Miss Vildy's good as eighteen-karat gold when she gets roun' to it, so she'll be all square; and Samanthy's got her blinders on 'n' don't see nothin' to the right nor to the left, so she's all square. And I ain't inteferin' with nobody. I'm jest lettin' things go the way they've started, 'n' stan'in' to one side to see whar they'll fetch up, kind o' like Providence. I'm leavin' Miss Vildy a free agent, but I'm shapin' circumstances so 's to give her a chance. But, land! if I'd fixed up the thing to suit myself I couldn't 'a' managed it as Timothy hez, 'thout knowin' that he was managin' anything. Look at that letter bizness now! I couldn't 'a' writ that letter better myself! And the sperrit o' the little feller, jest takin' his dorg 'n' lightin' out with nothin' but a perlite good-bye! Well I can't stop to talk no more 'bout it now, or we won't ketch him, but we'll jest try Wilkins's Woods, Maria, 'n' see how that goes. The river road leads to Edgewood 'n' Hillside, whar there's consid'able hayin' bein' done, as I happened to mention to Timothy this afternoon; and plenty o' blackberries 'side the road, 'specially after you pass the wood-pile on the left-hand side, whar there's a reg'lar garding of 'em right 'side of an old hoss-blanket that's layin' there; one that I happened to leave there one time when I was sleepin' ou'doors for my health, and that was this afternoon 'bout five o'clock, so I guess it hain't changed its location sence."
Jabe and Miss Vilda drove in silence along the river road that skirted Wilkins's Woods, a place where Jabe had taken Timothy more than once, so he informed Miss Vilda, and a likely road for him to travel if he were on his way to some of the near villages.