A FLIGHT IN SIGHT
"Venus Roe! Who's she?"
"D-don't you know? She's a little n-nigger girl about twelve years old, and belongs to Swithin. Some one in B-Boston gave her to him when she was a baby."
"Oh, yes! I remember now. I've heard father tell of meeting Swithin riding out from Boston, with a keg of rum in one saddle bag, and out of the other was sticking the head of a three-year-old nigger."
"Here comes a flight. Send up your long flyer, Amos."
Amos threw the flyer up. We watched the pigeons. They seemed to be coming toward us.
"Now send up the short flyers."
"They're coming to us. Pull the flyers down and keep hidden. Pull away at the string, Ben, and work the pole, so that the hoverer will keep his wings fluttering. Keep on, Ben. They see him."
The pigeons flew toward the flutterer, made a swirl in the air, and began to light on the pigeon pole. We took up our guns, and as they were hovering about the pole, trying to get a foothold, we fired, and ran out and picked up twenty-nine pigeons.
"That isn't bad," said Davy. "I tell you, Pigeon Tuesday is the day. There will be more along soon."