Harry Castlemon

“ In a moment more Godfrey would have been scudding across the field at the top of his speed. Tremblingly he approached Clarence, and had there been light enough to enable him to distinguish his features, the boy would have seen that they were as white as a sheet.
“You gave me to understand that you are not afraid of any man in the country,” continued the latter. “Now prove it. Reach out your hand and take hold of this fellow’s arm; and if you don’t feel solid flesh in your grasp, you may take yourself off as soon as you please!”
“Is it a man?” gasped Godfrey. ”

“ In a few minutes Dan returned and confronted his sire. His face wore a fierce frown, and he looked mad enough for almost anything. He began operations by jumping up and knocking his heels together, coming down with a jar and with his feet spread out as if he were bracing himself for a shock of some kind. This is an indispensable prelude to all games of fisticuffs in the South and West. No backwoods pugilist ever thinks of going into a fight without thus preparing himself for it. Sometimes a few Indian yells, given with all the power of the lungs, help matters wonderfully. ”

“ Ye look as though ye wanted to say something to me and didn’t know how to begin.”
“Mr. Evans, you would soon make yourself rich if you were to turn fortune-teller,” said Clarence. “You have hit the nail squarely on the head. Have a weed?”
As he spoke, he thrust his hand into one of the pockets of his game-bag, and brought it out again filled with cigars. Either by accident or design he brought something else, too—something that fell on the ground at Godfrey’s feet, and at which he gazed as if fascinated. It was the cob-pipe he had lost the night before in General Gordon’s potato patch. ”

“ He spends a little of his time in hunting, and a good deal more in grumbling at his hard luck. He might make a good living for his family with his rifle, if he felt so disposed, for game is abundant, and he is a good hunter and a capital shot; but he is too lazy to follow even that, the laziest of all occupations.”
After a few more questions Clarence learned so much of Godfrey’s history, and of his disposition and habits, that he began to think that he was already well acquainted with him; and besides Don described him so accurately that he could not fail to recognise him if he once met him. ”

“ He returned in a few minutes, and once more taking hold of the negro’s arm, he and Clarence assisted him over two or three fences, through a thick brier-patch which covered the site of his former comfortable dwelling, and finally halted in front of the potato-hole. It was simply an out-door cellar, the peak of the roof rising to the height of one’s shoulder, and the eaves resting on the ground. The cellar was quite deep enough to permit a tall man to stand upright in it, as Clarence found when he descended the stairs that led into it. ”

“ In the first place, we are glad to say that it is very different from turkey shooting as carried on in the Northern States. In the latter there is no sport whatever. The luckless turkey is tied to a stump, so that it has no chance for life, and the marksmen station themselves at distances varying from one to two hundred and fifty yards, and shoot at it, until some one kills or wounds it. It is a cruel practice, and no boy or man either who has the least spark of humanity or love of fair play in him, will engage in it. ”

“ Besides being famous as a wing shot, and being very fond of the breech-loader which created such havoc among the ducks, snipe and quails, he took care to have it known that he had bagged nobler game; and when he exhibited the old-fashioned muzzle loading rifle which his father had given him, and with which he had brought down his first deer, he never forgot to mention that four very fine bucks and one two year old bear had fallen to that same gun.
“Don would make a capital Harry Archer,” said Bert, continuing the soliloquy we have interrupted, “he is so fearless and enthusiastic. ”

“ These decoys are anchored off the point of which we have spoken, and Don and Bert, and the rest of the young hunters, hide behind their blinds—little breastworks of bushes erected on shore—and with their guns in their hands, hold themselves in readiness to shoot at the first flock that comes within range. And they are never obliged to wait long. The wild fowl, in passing from one end of the lake to the other, discover what they suppose to be a company of their friends swimming in perfect security near the shore, and stop to pay them a visit ”

“ Don, who met him in the hall, opened his eyes in surprise, and went into ecstacies over the handsome little breech-loader which Clarence presented for his inspection.
“I didn’t know that you city fellows ever had an opportunity to use such things as this,” said Don, bringing the weapon to his shoulder, and glancing along the clean, brown barrel.
“O, yes, we do,” said Clarence. “Rifle-shooting is becoming quite fashionable now-a-days, and I used to spend an hour or two every evening at the gallery. ”

“ The guerillas came next, and you see just what they left us. I thought things would go better with us when your father came home, but somehow they didn’t. Times have been growing harder instead of better. We’re getting poorer and poorer every year, and mercy knows what’s going to become of us!”
“Well, it’s one comfort to know that we can’t be much worse off than we are now,” said David. “It isn’t possible. But keep up a good heart, mother. I’ve got some news for you, and it’s better than that barrel business too, for it’s honest. I have a chance to make a hundred and fifty dollars.” ”

“ While he was thinking about it, Godfrey came back, [Pg 260] and almost before he knew it, he was confined in the cellar, and Clarence and Godfrey were out of hearing.
“Here I am,” thought Don, “and if I don’t get out and reach home very shortly after Clarence does there will be a hubbub indeed. I wish I hadn’t done it. What a desperate fellow that Clarence Gordon is! If he doesn’t turn over a new leaf pretty soon, he will come to some bad end as sure as he is a living boy. What will he have to say for himself when he finds out what he has done? ”

“ The old negro had certainly buried a barrel on the morning the levee was cut, and it contained silver-ware that, in good times, could have been bought for a thousand or fifteen hundred dollars. The barrel was dug up by another negro as soon as the soldiers were gone, and the most of the silver-ware was in use now, and had been ever since the war. The general thought this a good place to say something the boys would remember. People do sometimes get rich without labor, he said, but their wealth does not, as a rule, last long. To learn the value of money, one must work for it. ”

“ Then he took the packages from his pocket, one by one, and put them back in the opening just as he had found them—the powder first, the lead next, then the caps, and lastly the money; and when they were all in, he drove the pin back to its place and hung the harness upon it. He seemed to feel relieved after it was done. He drew a long breath, and started for the cabin to solace himself with a pipe, as he always did after he had exerted himself in any unusual degree. ”

“ I couldn’t face anybody after an act like that.”
“That is because you have never been guilty of a mean act in your life,” said Don. “One gets hardened to such things after a while. I know it by my experience at school. Probably Clarence has been in more scrapes than you and I ever dreamed of.”
That was not only very probable, but very true; but still he was not sufficiently hardened to face the consequences of this, which was one of the worst scrapes he had ever been in.
Half an hour later, Don’s pony came home riderless. ”

“ He was much too homesick to be any company during a ride, he said, and all he wanted was to go off somewhere and be alone. He would be himself in a day or two, and when he felt more like mingling with people, he would be quite at the service of his cousins, Don and Bert. The latter expressed their regrets, but readily accepted his excuses, and Clarence, after making some inquiries of Don, calculated to draw out information on a few points on which he wished to be posted, went up to his room to prepare himself for his interview with Godfrey Evans. ”

“ Dan and father shan’t see a cent of it, and neither will I spend any of it on myself. Mother needs it more than anybody else, and she shall have it all. Hallo!” exclaimed David, as the little piping note of warning the quail utters when suddenly disturbed, fell on his ear. “Come here, pup—I declare, I forgot to ask your master what your name is—come here, and let’s see how much or how little you know!”
David was standing close beside a fence which ran between the brier-patch and a stubble-field. ”

“ David was looking intently at his plate, but the expression on his face told that he was listening with all his ears. So Dan did not finish the sentence, but raised his hand to his face and shut one eye as if he were glancing along the barrel of a rifle.
“Goin’ to shoot ’em, be ye?” exclaimed his father. “Wal, say so then, and don’t be afraid. Nobody ain’t agoin’ to harm ye fur it.”
“Yes,” said Dan doggedly, seeing that his secret was out. “I’m goin’ to shoot ’em!”
“You hadn’t better stay about here after you do [Pg 23] it,” said David. “The general will have the law on you.” ”

“ Clarence, have they heard of it up to the Gordons?” asked Godfrey, almost in a whisper.
“There’s an awful row up there among the negroes about a ghost, or some such nonsense, if that’s what you mean,” answered Clarence. “There isn’t a black man or woman on the plantation that can be hired to go near the barn, and my uncle is afraid all his hands are going to leave him to gather his crops as best he can. ”

“ Their names were Donald and Hubert Gordon, and they lived about a mile from the cabin in which Godfrey Evans and his family lived. And in what part of the world was that? It doesn’t much matter, for as there is more truth than fiction in some of the incidents we are about to describe, we do not care to go too much into details. It will be enough to say that the scene of our story is laid, and that all the actors therein lived, in one of our Southern States not very far from the Mississippi river. ”

“ They both breathed easier when the work was over.
“Well, Godfrey,” said Clarence, “your potato-hole seems to be in pretty good condition yet; and you did manage to find something to tie the old nigger with after all, didn’t you? Now remember that it will not be safe for us to go near him during the daytime; some one might see us. We must give this cellar a wide berth for twenty-four hours. If the old fellow goes that length of time without anything to eat or drink, perhaps he will begin to think that we are in earnest.” ”

“ That was the kind of a hunter Dan was; but David, having learned what he knew of bird shooting from Don Gordon, who was a thoroughbred young sportsman, would have allowed the game to go off scot free before he would have made a “pot shot” at them. Shooting on the wing requires skill on the part of the hunter, and gives the game the best chance for its life; and this was the method David always adopted. He lifted the pup over the fence, got over himself, and with a waive of his hand and a “Hie on, old boy!” ”

“ But eighty thousand dollars! My stars! I don’t believe father ever had so much money at one time in his life. But suppose it was there, and Clarence should find it; it isn’t possible that he would be dishonest enough to keep it. I shouldn’t like to think that my own cousin was so great a rascal. Hold on! I’ve just thought of a trick that will beat the hollow pumpkin all to pieces.”
Talking thus to himself, Don carefully closed and locked the stable-door, and with noiseless footsteps stole along the fence until he arrived opposite the place where Clarence and Godfrey were at work in the field. ”

“ Clarence thought now that he would have played his game a little sharper if he had said nothing about stopping at Cairo; but, in order to make the story he had yet to tell appear reasonable, he was obliged to hold to what he had already said.
“Unfortunately I am not going to Cincinnati,” said he. “My business will take me no farther than Cairo. What’s the coat worth?”
“Well, I don’t think five dollars would be too much; do you?” ”