The Wreck of the Red Bird: A Story of the Carolina Coast

"I see him; he is crawling on his stomach to the fire. H – sh! let's see what he wants."

The man could be seen only in dim outline until he reached the fire, and, taking a smouldering brand, blew it to quicken its burning. The light thus created revealed his face, and the sight was not a pleasant one to the boys. They saw in their visitor as ugly and forbidding a specimen of untamed humanity as one often meets. He was a negro of the small, ugly, tough-looking variety, seen nowhere in this country except on the South Carolina and Georgia coast. About five feet two inches high, he had a small, flat head, large, muscular arms and body, short legs, and no clothing except a sort of sack with head- and arm-holes in it, worn as a shirt. His brow was so low and retreating, that his eyes seemed to project beyond it. His nose was flattened out as if it had tried to spread itself evenly all over his face. His thick lips were too short to cover his big teeth, and it is hardly necessary to add that he looked far less like a rational human being than like some wild animal.

When he had satisfied himself that his brand was burning, he crept a few paces further, and his purpose was revealed. He meant to set fire to the pile of plank that the boat was to be built of.

"Quick now," said Jack, "give him a volley of clubs and then charge!"

"GIVE HIM A VOLLEY AND THEN CHARGE!"

It was no sooner said than done. Standing at less than twenty feet distance, the boys threw one club each at the intruder, and then, snatching other clubs, one in each hand, rushed upon him. Rising, he knocked Jack down, but was brought to his own knees by Charley's club. At that moment the man's dog, a surly-looking brute, seized Charley, and it required the combined efforts of all three boys – for Jack was up again in an instant – to beat the creature off. While they were engaged in this, the dog's master, finding himself outnumbered and overmatched, took to his heels and the camp was clear, for the dog quickly followed, howling with pain.

"Are you much hurt, Charley?" was the first question asked when the enemy's retreat left the boys free to think of themselves.

"I'm pretty severely bitten," was the reply, "but luckily it's in the fleshy part of my thigh, and the flesh isn't torn. One of you must have struck very quickly, or I shouldn't have got off so easily. See," he continued, when the fire had been stirred into a blaze, "the brute buried his teeth, but let go again without shaking me."

"Yes, I saw him jump at you, and tried to hit him before he got hold," said Ned. "I must have struck him just as he seized you – half a second too late to save you entirely, but I hit him fairly on the head."

"And he had to let go of me to howl," said Charley, who, in spite of his pain, was in good spirits after the exciting encounter. "By the way, are you hurt, Jack?"

"I've an earache," said Jack, turning his head and showing an inflamed and swollen ear; "but I'm glad that fellow didn't hit me fairly in the face, as he meant to do. It would have settled the question of photographs for me for all time, I think. Why, if I had caught that blow on the face my nose would have been distributed over the rest of my countenance as evenly as his is."

"You look solemn, Ned," said Charley; "are you hurt too?"

"No, but I'm thinking."

"Well, out with your thought then. What is it?"

"Only that we're fairly in for it now."

"In for what?"

"War."

"War?"

"Yes. You don't suppose we're going to have peace with the squatters now, do you? They'll attack us in force as sure as sunrise and sunset."

"Well, it's my opinion that one of them, at least, has got as much of us as he wants," said Charley.

"Very likely," answered Ned; "but now he'll want to give us something, by way of returning the compliment. He'll bring all his friends with him next time."

"But I don't see what we've done that they should interfere with us."

"Oh! don't you? Well, that's because you don't look at the matter with their eyes. You see, when we first came here they didn't object. They took a fancy to our coffee and flour and bacon, and the rest of it, and helped themselves, but they didn't in the least object to us or our presence. Having got all we had for them to steal, they let us alone. But when they found that we were getting rice out of what they called their field, it put a new face on the matter, and they objected. You baffled the one that got after you, and he hurt himself trying to catch you. That was another offence on our part, and so this fellow that was here to-night determined to get even with us by burning us out. He has been pretty badly whipped, and he isn't likely to forget it. He'll bring all his friends here and we must take care of ourselves, for we shan't get any coddling, I can assure you, if we fall into their hands."

"You are right, Ned," said Jack; "and now we must really take care of ourselves. It's nearly morning, and we may as well get breakfast at once and get an early start. We must be ready to receive those fellows when they come."

CHAPTER XVIII

A CAMP-FACTORY

Breakfast was finished before daylight that morning, and when it was over the three companions resumed work upon their fortification. Ned stopped long enough to catch some shrimps for dinner, but with that exception there was no break at all in the morning's work, and dinner-time found the boys tired as well as hungry. The afternoon was spent quite as industriously, and when night came the fort, though still incomplete, was well advanced toward security.

"Now," said Ned, when supper-time came, "we have had rather too much of shrimps, I think, and of oysters too. I'm going out with the net to-night to catch some fish for to-morrow. What do you two propose to do?"

"I'm going to make some more clubs," said Charley. "We've something like a fort now, and the next thing is to provide an abundance of ammunition."

"By the way," said Ned, "why can't we make some better arms?"

"Of what sort?" asked Jack.

"Well, bows and arrows, for example. We can make arrow-heads out of some of our copper bolts, and they are weapons not to be despised – what are you smiling at, Charley?"

"Oh! nothing; I was only wondering what good bows and arrows would do without bowstrings."

Ned's countenance fell; then he joined in the smile of his companions, and admitted that his little plan had been very imperfectly worked out in his head.

"I might make some blow-guns out of the canes," he said, "but they're not worth making. I have killed birds with them, but I've tried them thoroughly and they won't shoot hard enough to drive an arrow-head half an inch into a pine plank; so they would be worthless for our purposes."

"Yes," said Jack, "I think we may make up our minds that we've got to get on with no better weapons than our clubs for general use, with the axe, hatchet, and digging tools to fall back upon as a last resort. To use such things means to kill, and of course we don't want to do that."

"No, of course not. We only want to protect ourselves and make these squatters let us alone. We don't want to do the poor creatures any unnecessary harm."

Saying this, Ned took the net and went away in search of fish. When he had gone Jack said:

"Charley, let's build a platform to fight from."

"I don't quite understand you," said Charley.

"Well, you see the stockade is ten feet high, and slopes outward, and so it won't be easy for anybody to scale it; but it isn't impossible, particularly if one has time to put up a pole or two to climb on. My notion is that we must be prepared to interfere with anybody who tries to do that. We must build a sort of platform all around inside the stockade, about six feet from the ground; it needn't be any thing more than a row of poles laid against the stockade and supported by some forked stakes. We can then stand up on these poles and look over the top of the stockade. If anybody tries to climb up, we can beat him back from there, while if we were on the ground inside here, we should be nearly helpless. It won't take you and me more than half an hour or so to rig the thing up."

"That's a good idea," replied Charley; "and we need the platform more to-night than we shall at any time hereafter."

"Why?"

"Because if those fellows mean to attack us they will do so at once. If we escape to-night we're not likely to be attacked at all."

"I don't know about that," answered Jack. "On the contrary, I think they'll let us alone to-night, because they'll expect us to be on the lookout for them. They have no special fancy for getting their heads broken, and when they come they will try to take us by surprise. At least that's my notion."

"Then you think they are likely to attack us later this week or next?"

"Yes, at any time except to-night. They will wait for us to make up our minds that they aren't coming at all."

"Well – that fabula docet that we mustn't make up our minds in that direction at all."

"Exactly. We must be as alert two weeks hence as we are now – if we're here so long. But come, let's get to work."

Cutting some forked stakes, which did not need to be driven far into the ground, because they were to be leant toward the sloping stockade, the boys placed them in position, and laid poles from one to another until the line stretched all the way around the enclosure. It was easy to walk upon these poles all the way around, and when standing upon them the boys' shoulders were above the top of the stockade.