The Big Brother | Page 6

on top of us in a minute. Come!--don't make any noise, but follow me. Crawl on your hands and knees, and don't raise your heads. Look out for sticks. If you break one, the Indians 'll hear it."
"Mas' Sam--dey's Injuns ahead'n us an' a-comin right torge us too. Look dar!"
Sam looked, and saw a body of Indians just in front of him coming to reinforce the others. He and his friends were cut off between two bodies of savages.
"Lie down and be still," he whispered. "It's all we can do--and I'm to blame for it all!"
CHAPTER III.
SAM'S LECTURE.
The people of the fort made no search for Sam and his companions; not because they cared nothing for them, but simply because they believed them certainly dead. Mr. Hardwicke, himself, had seen Sam start with little Judie towards the fort, before the dog charge was made, and as neither the boys nor Judie had ever reached the gates, he had no doubt whatever that his three children were slain, as was Mrs. Phillips, the only other person who had failed to get inside the stockade. Mr. Hardwicke wished to go out in search of their bodies, but was overruled by his companions, who, knowing that the savages were still in the immediate vicinity, thought it simply a reckless and unnecessary risk, to go hunting for the bodies of their friends hundreds of yards away, and immediately in front of the place at which the Indians were last seen. The idea was abandoned, therefore, and the fort party marched away in the darkness of a cloudy night, towards Fort Glass. Leaving them to find their way if they can, let us return to Sam and his little band. Seeing the Indians coming towards them, they lay down in the high weeds. The savages hurrying forward to reinforce their friends, passed within a few feet of the young people, but did not see them. The storming of the fort then began, and after watching the evolutions of the Indians for some time, Sam said:
"We mustn't stay here. Those red skins are working around this way, and 'll find us. Crawl on your hands and knees, all of you, and follow me."
"Whar's ye gwine to, Mas' Sam?" asked Joe.
"Sh, sh," said Judie. "Don't talk Joe, but do as Brother Sam tells you. Don't you know he always knows what's best? Besides, maybe he hasn't quite found out where he's going yet, himself."
But Joe was not as confident of Sam's genius for doing the right thing as Judie was, and so, after crawling for some distance, he again broke silence.
"Miss Judie."
"What do you want, Joe?"
"Does you know whar Mas' Sam's a-takin' us to, an' what he's gwine to do when he gits dar?"
"No, of course I don't."
"How you know den, dat he's doin' de bes' thing?"
But the conversation was terminated by a word from Sam, who said, in a whisper,
"Joe, I'll tell you where we're going if you keep talking."
"Whar, Mas' Sam?"
"Into the hands of the Indians. Keep your mouth shut, if you don't want your hair lifted off your head."
As the black boy certainly did not want his hair cut Indian fashion, he became silent at once.
When they had travelled in this way until they could no longer hear the yells of the Indians and the popping of guns at the fort, Sam called a halt. It was now nearly midnight.
"Here is a good place to spend the rest of the night," he said, "and we must be as still as we can. We can stay here till to-morrow night, and then we must try to get to Fort Glass. It's about twelve or thirteen miles from here."
"Le's go on now, Mas' Sam; I'se afear'd to stay here," said the black boy.
"We can't," said Sam. "I got scratched in the foot with a stray bullet, just as we went into the thicket there at the fort, and I can't walk. I am a little faint and must lie down."
At this little Judie, who fairly idolized Sam, and felt perfectly safe from Indians and everything else when he was with her, was disposed to set up a wail of sorrow and fright. If poor Sam were wounded, he might die, she thought, and the thought was too much for her.
Sam soothed her, however, and the poor, tired little girl was soon fast asleep in his arms.
"Bring some moss, boys," he said to his companions, "and make a bed for Judie here by this log."
When he had laid her down, he drew off his shoe and wrapped the wounded foot in some of the long gray moss which hangs in great festoons from the trees of that region. Joe, with the true negro genius for sleeping, was already snoring at the foot of a tree. Sam quietly