Bobby Blake on a Plantation: or, Lost in the Great Swamp

“I don’t blame them,” remarked Bobby. “But come now, fellows, let’s get along. There’s nothing to keep us here any longer, unless,” he added with a laugh, “Fred wants to take this fellow’s head along as a souvenir.”

“Not on your life!” declared Fred emphatically. “I’ll see that head often enough in my dreams as it is. Gee, Bobby,” he continued with a sigh of relief, “it was a mighty lucky thing you had that hatchet along with you.”

“And luckier yet that he threw it just right,” put in Lee. “That’s what comes from being a good ball player. One learns how to throw.”

“Don’t give me any credit for that,” protested Bobby. “I might just as well have hit him with the handle instead of the blade. Luck sure was with us.”

They left the loathsome reptile and made their way to higher ground, picking their steps with exceeding care and avoiding as they would the plague anything that looked like a thick stick.

Bobby was going ahead as fast as the tangled vines and shrubbery would let him, when he gave an exclamation and fell to his knees.

“What’s the matter?” asked his companions in alarm, running up to him.

“Stubbed my toe on something hard,” explained Bobby, rising to his feet and brushing himself off, “and barked my shins in the bargain as I went down. Kicked against a stone, I imagine.”

“That’s funny,” said Lee. “There are mighty few stones around here. It must have been a stump.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter much,” replied Bobby. “It brought me down all right, whether it was wood or stone. But just for curiosity, I’m going to find out.”

He kicked away the grass and twigs and bent down to look.

“Why, that’s queer!” he exclaimed. “It’s stone, as I thought, but it isn’t a rock. It’s been shaped with a chisel and it looks as though it had figures or letters on it.”

“How on earth did a thing like that get here?” asked Fred, in a puzzled tone.

“I can make out something like the letter C,” said Bobby. “C-A-R-T – why, Lee, I believe it’s your name!”

The next instant he leaped to his feet, as the full significance of his discovery flashed upon him.

“Hurrah!” he shouted. “Glory hallelujah! Lee, we’ve found one of the boundary stones of your mother’s property.”

“What?” cried Lee, all a-tremble with excitement.

“Are you sure?” queried Fred, dropping on hands and knees beside his friend.

“It sure looks like it,” affirmed Bobby, digging away like mad to uncover more of the stone.

The others followed his example and made the dirt fly, for all the world, as Fred said afterward, “like dogs digging out a woodchuck.”

A few minutes of hard work, and enough of the stone was uncovered to permit them to make out the inscription. It was time-stained and weatherbeaten, but read as follows:

S. E. Limit of property of N. CARTIER, Laboulaye Parish, La.

Then followed some surveyor’s signs and symbols, which to the boys were like so much Greek. Underneath these however was an arrow pointing in a certain direction, and Bobby studied this for several minutes with great attention.

“What do you make of it?” asked Fred curiously, as he noted his friend’s puckered brow.

“This arrow means something,” replied Bobby, “and I think we’d better follow in the direction in which it points. I tell you what we do. You stand here, Fred, and Lee and I will follow the line of the arrow. If you see us getting out of line, you wave to us and set us right.”

This was agreed to, and Bobby and Lee set out. They had gone a distance of perhaps two hundred yards, when Bobby’s keen eyes saw a rim of stone just projecting above the ground. They cleared away the moss and rubbish about it and found that it was another landmark, practically the same as the first, except that in this case the arrow pointed slightly in another direction, showing that the boundary line veered at that point.

They shouted to Fred and he quickly rejoined them.

“Now,” said Bobby jubilantly, “the rest will be easy. All we’ve got to do is to report the location of these two stones and a surveying party can go from stone to stone and so trace out the whole boundary line of the property.”

“Look!” exclaimed Fred suddenly, pointing to the right.

They looked and saw a figure just vanishing behind a tree.

CHAPTER XXIX

’RASTUS ABIMELECH BELSHAZZAR JOHNSON

“Who can that be?” asked Fred, as the startled boys focused their eyes on the tree.

“Search me,” replied Bobby. “But whoever it is, we want to talk to him right away. It isn’t likely he intends any harm, and maybe he’ll know a way to get out of this swamp.”

“More likely he’s lost in it, just the same as ourselves,” conjectured Fred, but followed Bobby and Lee who had already started in the direction of the tree.

When they were within twenty feet of it, they halted.

“Hello there!” sang out Bobby. “Come out from behind that tree, please. We want to talk to you.”

A woolly head peered cautiously around the side of the tree and then a diminutive darkey boy appeared in full view.

Recognition on both sides was instantaneous.

“Why,” cried Lee, “that’s the boy who fell overboard on the way down from New York, the one that Bobby saved by throwing him the life preserver!”

“The one with the long name!” exclaimed Fred. “Let’s see, it was – ”

“’Rastus Abimelech Belshazzar Johnson,” finished the little darkey proudly, with a grin that showed all his white teeth. “An’ Ah sure am spifflicated to meet all you young gem’mun agin, speshul dis one what saved mah life,” indicating Bobby.

“Maybe you can do the same for us now,” said Bobby. “We’re lost in this swamp. Do you know the way out?”

“Ah sho will,” replied ’Rastus, and a moment flash of his gleaming ivories. “Ah wuz bo’n an’ brung up only a few miles fum heah. Reckon Ah cud fin’ mah way fru dis yeah swamp wiv mah eyes shet.”

This was indeed good news to the boys, who felt as if a thousand tons had been lifted from their hearts.

“Fac’ is,” continued ’Rastus, “Ah cum along wiv a pahty what wuz lookin’ fur you-all. Dey’s only a little way fum heah, an’ Ah specs Ah’d better go an’ info’mation dem dat you-all ez heah.”

“You bet you would,” cried Lee. “Hurry up, ’Rastus, and you’ll find that this was the best day’s work you ever did.”

“’Rastus is going to be our Moses to lead us out of the wilderness,” cried Fred gleefully.

“Mah name ain’t Moses,” replied their deliverer. “It am ’Rastus Abimelech Belshazzar Johnson.”

“And a mighty good name it is,” said Bobby, “and one that we’ll always remember. But now let’s see how quick you’ll be in finding the other people and bringing them here.”