The young savage lifted his eyes, and stared aghast at the apparition.
“The Evil Spirit catch boy's stick! It reaches clear down from the sky! Look! look, my brothers!”
The remaining youths, full of curiosity, not unmixed with fear, came forward. Torches blazed for a moment about Gopher Gid, and then retreated suddenly, their holders uttering cries of terror.
But all did not immediately fly from the Evil Spirit. The leader sprung forward again, but did not glance at the hand. He now had no dogs to beat back; the animals were flying with their owners, glad to escape from the death-dealing club.
The Indian boy leaped to the foot of the tree.
“Wachetoc, the Bad Spirit, cannot set the white boy free,” he said, showing the knife that glistened in his right hand. “He has fought well; he shall live, but he must go away.”
Then the knife cut the cords that bound the boy's legs to the cottonwood, and as he tottered forward like a drunken man, the liberator, with a horrified glance at the ghostly hand overhead, snatched up his torch and ran away.
“I am free!” exclaimed Gopher Gid. “The hole in the hill shall see me yet. That devilish hand has saved me. Now if Midnight Jack and Rube were here! Hark! what was that?—the club has fallen down!”
“It is Tanglefoot's hand!” he suddenly cried.
Eager to set his doubts at rest, Gopher Gid stood on tiptoe, but could scarcely touch the fingers. He then drew the carcasses of several of the dogs out of the fallen brutes to the spot, and mounted the pile with better success.