"I hear 'em say, but I disremember," answered July with seeming sincerity.
"A mighty good name for it would be Deserters' Island,'" remarked Ted, rising to join Hubert, who now stood by the fire drying his wet trousers.
VI
AS the boys stood steaming by the fire, Ted using his wet handkerchief to clean the mud and slime from his trousers, more questions were asked, and in response to inquiry as to the present whereabouts of the hiding slackers, the negro said:
"Dey ain't come in yet. Some of 'em runnin' a deer and some gone to dey traps." July pointed to the skins hanging from grape-vines and bear-grass ropes under the elevated house of logs and beneath a low shelter of thatched palmetto fans. "Dey in de trappin' business," he added.
At this moment some one was heard coming through the brush, singing in a peculiar childish voice: "Open the gates as high as the sky and let King George's army pass by."
"Dat's Billy," said July. "He ain't got good sense."
A barefoot young white man, roughly clothed, entered the clearing at a trot and ran up to the two boys. Fixing his eye on Ted, he inquired with a giggle, "What's your name?" When Ted had told him, he turned to Hubert with the same question. His hair was light in color and soft as a child's, but his face was wrinkled and wore a meaningless smile. His pale eyes were vacant yet restless.
"He's Sweet Jackson's nigger same as I'm Mr. Buck Hardy's," explained July, showing his white, even teeth. "I found him in yuh waitin' on Sweet when I come. But Mr. Hardy don't cuff me round de way Sweet do Billy. He don't think nothin' o' takin' a stick to dat half-witted boy when he git mad. It's scan'lous."