They asked me how I had found them, and I truthfully replied that I did not know, at which they rolled their eyes and looked at me in a peculiar manner, when I added that I was walking around the cabins in the hope of finding someone awake, and heard Sam tell Taylor to roll over. This satisfied them, but it has never satisfied me, for, while I heard the voice almost as soon as I halted, I could have passed the cabin in the short interval had I kept on, and in such event I could not have heard what I did.
My going directly to the cabins may be attributed to the instinct which sometimes leads men, and my passing to the rear of the farther cabins first to an accident of direction, but I never could account, on any theory of chance or instinct, for the coincidence of my halt at the proper place at the only instant in which I could have heard the call of Sam to Taylor.
We reached Rummel and Miller in so short a time after my departure from them as to cause an inquiry from them as to how I had managed to find the darkeys so quickly. I postponed explanation until later, and we proceeded to business.
The negroes had cooked us a goodly amount of hog meat and a pone of corn bread, but the meat was only such as they could procure in a hurry, and consisted of the livers, lights, noses and such portions of the animal as would not be used by the planter and his family.
The skiff of the darkeys had been lodged, during high water, behind a tree, and when we got it down and afloat it looked like a sieve. We caulked it as best we could with leaves and some old rags, but the thing was a failure, and none of us cared to risk it.
Sam offered to pilot us to Little Rock himself, crossing the river lower down and then going across the country, but this offer we declined, because of the almost certainty of death if runaway prisoners were caught with a runaway negro. Sam still insisted, however, saying that he had a rifle and seven rounds of ammunition, and that we could fight if we had to, but we positively refused to take him with us, and the man was actually inclined to be angry. The matter was settled by Taylor giving us directions to follow the river down stream until we found a cabin in a certain spot, which he described, and we set off in high glee, Taylor further informing us that his name would make everything right with the owners of the cabin, and that we would find a willing and able ferryman there.
It was now nearly morning, and we hastened on our way; but, when we came to the spot where Taylor had told us we would find a path to the cabin, we found that a large force of cavalry had recently been camped there, and all signs of any regular path were completely obliterated by the trampled condition of the ground and the many trails leading in all directions, while an immense quantity of corn shucks were strewn all about the place.
We made a circuit of the camp, and finally struck off on a path which looked as if it might be the one meant by Taylor, but we had not gone a great ways when it became a blind lead, and we were soon lost in the canebrake. The cane made it too dark to proceed farther, and we went into camp.
When daylight came we found ourselves in a great bend of the river, and a little feeling around showed us a number of cavalry horses turned loose. We therefore kept quiet, in a part of the bottom where the cane was so thick that we once heard a man rounding up the horses without our being able to see him. As Rummel expressed it, "We couldn't have found a cow right there if we had had hold of her tail."
After a while we stole out to where we could see without being seen, and discovered a tent and big fire not far away, while in the distance was a band of music moving away with an escort of rebel cavalry. Around the tent and fire were a lot of men and cavalry horses, and we concluded to adjourn.