“Hit ain’t de river, hit am de bayou! De bayou’s comin’ out, en’ ef you don’ min’, sah, we’s obleeged ter move!”
Edward rose, stretching himself. “Move where?”
“Ter Cape Jessamine, sah. Bayou can’t git dat far, en’ dey sho’ ain’t gwine let de river come out ef dey kin help hit!”
The floor was ankle deep in yellow water. Suddenly the door blew open. There entered streaming rain and a hiss of wind. The negro, gathering into a bundle his meagre wardrobe and bedding, shook his head and made haste. Edward took his rifle and ragged hat. The water deepened and put the fire out. The two men emerged from the cabin into a widening lake, seething and eddying between the dark trees. Behind them the hut tilted a little upon its rude foundation. The negro looked back. “Liked dat house, en’ now hit’s er-gwine, too! Bayou never come out lak dat befo’ dishyer war!”
Out of the knee-deep water at last, they struck into something that to the feet felt like a road. On either hand towering cypresses made the intense night intenser. It was intense, and yet out of the bosom of the clouds, athwart the slant rain, came at times effects of light. One saw and one did not see; there was a sense of dim revelations, cloudy purposes of earth, air, and water, given and then withdrawn before they could be read. But there was one thing heard plainly, and that was the voice of the Mississippi River.
They were going toward it, Edward found. Once, in the transient and mysterious lightening of the atmosphere, he thought that he saw it gleaming before them. The impression was lost, but it returned. He saw that they were at the base of a tongue of land, set with gigantic trees, running out into the gleaming that was the river. The two were now upon slightly rising ground, and they had the sweep of the night before them.
“Fo’ Gawd!” said the negro; “look at de torches on de levee! River’s mekkin’ dem wuhk fer dey livin’ to-night at Cape Jessamine!”
CHAPTER II
CAPE JESSAMINE
The two came from beneath the dripping trees out upon the cleared bank of the Mississippi, and into a glare of pine torches. The rain had lessened, the fitful wind beat the flames sideways, but failed to conquer them. There was, too, a tar barrel burning. The light was strong and red enough, a pulsing heart of light shading at its edges into smoky bronze and copper, then, a little further, lost in the wild night. The river curved like a scimitar, and the glare showed the turbulent edge of it and the swirling cross-current that was setting a tooth into the Cape Jessamine levee.
’Rasmus spoke. “Dis was always de danger place. Many er time I’ve seen de Cun’l ride down heah, en’ stand er-lookin’!”