He warmed, he breathed, he groaned, he spoke!
His voice was like a happy sigh, as of one disturbed near the end of a
comforting morning nap in summer:
"You thar, Mary?"
He stared around with difficulty, his wounded face now clotted and
stained with blood, and his eyes next looked an inquiry so kind and
apprehensive that she answered it, to save him breath:
"Baby's drowned. God does best!"
He reached his hand to hers--she was almost naked to the waist, having
sacrificed all she had, the greatest of which was modesty, to bring back
that life in him which came naked and unashamed into the world--and he
put his little strength into the grasp.
"Mary," he exhaled, "why didn't you ketch the baby and leave me go?"
"Oh, dearly as I loved it," the woman answered, "I'm glad you come up
under my hands instead. You can do good: you're a white man. Baby would
have only been a poor slave, or a free negro nobody would care for."
"I mean to do good, if the Lord lets me," sighed the sailor; "I mean to
go and die agin for human natur at Johnson's Cross-roads."
CHAPTER XXIV.
OLD CHIMNEYS.
The day was far advanced when Jimmy Phoebus was strong enough to rise
and walk, and leave the refuge in the woods. He advised the colored
woman to crawl through the pine-trees along the margin, while he paddled
in the old scow in the shadow of the forest, which now lay strong upon
the river's breast.
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