bless you, missis!” said Sam, “horses won’t be cotched all in a minute; they’d done clared out way down to the south pasture, and the Lord knows whar!”
“Sam, how often must I tell you not to say ‘Lord bless you,’ and ‘The Lord knows,’ and such things? It’s wicked.”
“Oh, Lord bless my soul! I done forgot, missis! I won’t say nothing of de sort no more.”
“Why, Sam, you just have said it again.”
“Did I? Oh, Lord! I mean—I didn’t go fur to say it.”
“You must be careful, Sam.”
“Just let me get my breath, missis, and I’ll start fair. I’ll be bery careful.”
“Well, Sam, you are to go with Mr. Haley, to show him the road, and help him. Be careful of the horses, Sam; you know Jerry was a little lame last week; don’t ride them too fast.”
Mrs. Shelby spoke the last words with a low voice, and strong emphasis.
“Let dis child alone for dat!” said Sam, rolling up his eyes with a volume of meaning. “Lord knows! Hi! Didn’t say dat!” said he, suddenly catching his breath, with a ludicrous flourish of apprehension, which made his mistress laugh, spite of herself. “Yes, missis, I’ll look out for de hosses!”
“Now, Andy,” said Sam, returning to his stand under the beech-tree, “you see I wouldn’t be ’tall surprised if dat ar gen’l’man’s crittur should gib a fling by and by, when he comes to be a gettin’ up. You know, Andy, critturs will do such things;” and therewith Sam poked Andy in the side, in a highly suggestive manner.
“Hi!” said Andy, with an air of instant appreciation.
“Yes, you see, Andy, missis wants to make time—dat ar’s clar to der most or’nary ’bserver. I jis make a little for her. Now, you see, get all dese yer hosses loose, caperin’ permiscus round dis yer lot and down to de wood dar, and I ‘spec mas’r won’t be off in a hurry.”
Andy grinned.
“Yer see,” said Sam, “yer see, Andy, if any such thing should happen as that Mas’r Haley’s horse should begin to act contrary, and cut up, you and I jist lets go of our’n to help him, and we’ll help him—oh, yes!” And Sam and Andy laid their heads back on their shoulders, and broke into a low, immoderate laugh, snapping their fingers and flourishing their heels with exquisite delight.
At this instant, Haley appeared on the verandah. Somewhat mollified by certain cups of very good coffee, he came out smiling and talking, in tolerably restored humour. Sam and Andy, clawing for certain fragmentary palm-leaves which they were in the habit of considering as hats, flew to the horse-posts, to be ready to “help mas’r.”
Sam’s palm-leaf had been ingeniously disentangled from all pretensions to braid, as respects its brim; and the slivers, starting apart, and standing upright, gave it a blazing air of freedom and defiance, quite equal to that of any Fiji chief; while the whole brim of Andy’s being departed bodily, he rapped the crown on his head with a dexterous thump, and looked about well pleased, as if to say, “Who says I haven’t got a hat?”
“Well, boys,” said Haley, “look alive now; we must lose no time.”
“Not a bit of him, mas’r!” said Sam, putting Haley’s rein in his hand, and holding his stirrup, while Andy was untying the other two horses.
The instant Haley touched the saddle the mettlesome creature bounded from the earth with a sudden spring that threw his master sprawling, some feet off, on the soft, dry turf. Sam, with frantic ejaculations, made a dive at the reins, but only succeeded in brushing the blazing palm-leaf aforenamed into the horse’s eyes, which by no means tended to allay the confusion of his nerves. So, with great vehemence, he overturned Sam, and, giving two or three contemptuous snorts, flourished his heels vigorously in the air, and was soon prancing away toward the lower end of the lawn, followed by Bill and Jerry, whom Andy had not failed to let loose, according to contract, speeding them off with various direful ejaculations. And now ensued a miscellaneous scene of confusion. Sam and Andy ran and shouted—dogs barked here and there—and Mike, Mose, Mandy, Fanny, and all the smaller specimens on the place, both male and female, raced, clapped hands, whooped, and shouted, with outrageous officiousness and untiring zeal.
Haley’s horse, which was a white one, and very fleet and spirited, appeared to enter into the spirit of the scene with great gusto; and having for his coursing ground a lawn of nearly half a mile in extent, gently sloping down on every side into indefinite woodland, he appeared to take infinite delight in seeing how near he could allow his pursuers to approach him, and then, when within a hand’s breadth, whisk off with a start and a snort, like a mischievous beast as he was, and career far down into some alley of the wood-lot. Nothing was further from Sam’s mind than to have any one of the troop taken until such season as should seem to him most befitting—and the exertions that he made were certainly most heroic. Like the sword of Coeur de Lion, which always blazed in the front and thickest of the battle, Sam’s palm-leaf was to be seen everywhere when there was the least danger that a horse could be caught;—there he would bear down full tilt, shouting, “Now for it! cotch him! cotch him!” in a way that would set everything to indiscriminate rout in a moment.
Haley ran up and down, and cursed and swore and stamped miscellaneously. Mr. Shelby in vain tried to shout directions from the balcony, and Mrs. Shelby from her chamber window alternately laughed and wondered—not without some inkling of what lay at the bottom of all this confusion.
At last, about twelve o’clock, Sam appeared triumphant, mounted on Jerry, with Haley’s horse by his side, reeking with sweat, but with flashing eyes and dilated nostrils, showing that the spirit of freedom had not yet entirely subsided.
“He’s cotched!” he exclaimed triumphantly. “If’t hadn’t been for me, they might ‘a’ bust theirselves, all on ’em; but I cotched him!”
“You!” growled Haley, in no amiable mood. “If it hadn’t been for you, this never would have happened.”
“Lord bless us, mas’r,” said Sam, in a tone of the deepest concern, “and me that has been racin’ and chasin’ till the sweat jest pours off me!”
“Well, well!” said Haley, “you’ve lost me near three hours, with your cursed nonsense. Now let’s be off, and have no more fooling.”
“Why, mas’r,” said Sam, in a deprecating tone, “I believe you mean to kill us all clar, horses and all. Here we are all jest ready to drop down, and the critturs all in a reek of sweat. Why, mas’r won’t thing of startin’ on now till after dinner. Mas’r’s hoss wants rubben’ down; see how he splashed himself: and Jerry limps too; don’t think missis would be willin’ to have us start dis yer way, nohow. Lord bless you, mas’r, we can ketch up, if we do stop. Lizy never was no great of a walker.”
Mrs. Shelby, who, greatly to her amusement, had overheard this conversation from the verandah, now resolved to do her part. She came forward, and, courteously expressing her concern for Haley’s accident, pressed him to stay to dinner, saying that the cook should bring it on the table immediately.
Thus, all things considered, Haley, with rather an equivocal glance, proceeded to the parlour, while Sam, rolling his eyes after him with unutterable meaning, proceeded gravely with the horses to the stable-yard.
“Did
