Cubina did not undeceive him as to the cause.
“And where?” interrogated he, in hurried phrase. “Where did you meet the ghost?”
“I didn’t zackly meet it,” answered Quaco. “I only seed it on the road afore me—’bout a hundred yards or tharaway. I wor near enuf to be sure o’ it—and it was Chakra’s ghost—jess as I seed him t’other day up thar by the Duppy Hole. The old villain can’t sleep in his grave. He’s about these woods yet.”
“How far was it from where you met Mr Vaughan?”
“Not a great way, Cappin. ’Bout a quarrer o’ a mile, I shed think. Soon as it spied me, it tuk to the bushes, and I seed no more on it. It was atter daylight, and the cocks had crowed. I heard ’em crowing at ole Jobson’s plantation close by, and, maybe, that sent the duppy a-scuttlin’ into the river.”
“We must wait no longer for this young man—we must be gone from here, Quaco.”
And as Cubina expressed this intention, he appeared about to move away from the spot.
“Stop, Cappin,” said Quaco, interrupting with a gesture that showed he had something more to communicate; “you han’t heard all. I met more of ’em.”
“More of whom?”
“That same queer sort. But two mile atter I’d passed the place where I seed the duppy o’ the ole myal-man, who dye think I met nex’?”