“Worse for you if she don’t, Johnny,” said Bob; “worse for you, I say.”
Johnny muttered something in reply, but I did not distinguish what it was, for my eyes closed, and I again fell asleep.
It seemed as if I had not been five minutes slumbering when the mulatto returned with the soup. The tea had revived me, but this gave me strength; and when I had taken it I was able to sit up in the bed.
Whilst the woman fed me, Bob ate his beefsteak. It was a piece of meat that might have sufficed for six persons, but the man was as hungry as if he had eaten nothing for three days. He cut off wedges half as big as his fist, swallowed them with ravenous eagerness, and, instead of bread, bit into some unpeeled potatoes. All this was washed down with glass after glass of raw spirits, which had the effect of wakening him up, and infusing a certain cheerfulness into his strange humour. He still spoke more to himself than to Johnny, but his recollections seemed agreeable; he nodded self-approvingly, and sometimes laughed aloud. At last he began to abuse Johnny for being, as he said, such a sneaking, cowardly fellow—such a treacherous, false-hearted gallows-bird.
“It’s true,” said he, “I am gallows-bird enough myself, but then I’m open, and no man can say I’m afeard; but Johnny, Johnny, who——”
I do not know what he was about to say, for Johnny sprang towards him, and placed both hands over his mouth, receiving in return a blow that knocked him as far as the door, through which he retreated, cursing and grumbling.
I soon fell asleep again, and whilst in that state I had a confused consciousness of various noises in the room, loud words, blows, and shouting. Wearied as I was, however, I believe no noise would have fully roused me, although hunger at last did.
When I opened my eyes I saw the mulatto woman sitting by my bed, and keeping off the mosquitoes. She brought me the remainder of the soup, and promised, if I would sleep a couple of hours more, to bring me as good a beefsteak as ever came off a gridiron. Before the two hours had elapsed I awoke, hungrier than ever. After I had eaten all the beefsteak the woman would allow me, which was a very moderate quantity, she brought me a beer-glass full of the most delicious punch I ever tasted. I asked her where she had got the rum and lemons, and she told me that it was she who had bought them, as well as a stock of coffee and tea; that Johnny was her partner, but that he had done nothing but build the house, and badly built it was. She then began to abuse Johnny, and said he was a gambler, and worse still; that he had had plenty of money once, but had lost it all; that she had first known him in Lower Natchez, but he had been obliged to run away from there in the night to save his neck. Bob was no better, she said; on the contrary—and here she made the gesture of cutting a man’s throat—he was a very bad fellow, she added. He had got drunk after his dinner, knocked Johnny down, and broken everything. He was now lying asleep outside the door; and Johnny had hidden himself somewhere.
How long she continued speaking I know not, for I again fell into a deep sleep, which this time lasted six or seven hours.
I was awakened by a strong grasp laid upon my arm, which made me cry out, more, however, from alarm than pain. Bob stood by my bedside; the traces of the preceding night’s debauch plainly written on his haggard countenance. His blood-shot eyes were inflamed and swollen, and rolled with even more than their usual wildness; his mouth was open, and the jaws were stiff and fixed; he looked like one fresh from the perpetration of some frightful deed. I could fancy the first murderer to have worn such an aspect when gazing on the body of his slaughtered brother. I shrank back, horror-struck at his appearance.