The kidnapper shook his captive, but he did not awaken. He turned the
man over, and there met his eyes the cold blue stare and Roman nose and
bleeding lips of Allan McLane, apparently returned from the bottom of
the river.
With a shriek, the outlaw bounded upon the deck and ran to the bow of
the pungy.
"Help me!" came a faint cry from the forecastle, and, peeping in, Joe
Johnson recognized one of his own familiars he had shipped at Cannon's
Ferry, gagged, like his companion, and tied fast. The man had just been
able to articulate.
"Now, spiflicate me!" spoke the skipper, relieving the man, "the ruffian
cly you! who did this?"
"The white nigger did it all, Joe. He crawled through the stays to the
cabin, and got your pistols, first; leastways, we found him an' the
yaller feller at the helm on top of us, coming up the fo'castle, and
next t'other two men jined 'em. They said ole Samson had give 'em the
wink. We two was tied and throwed in yer, an' ef you had awaked, thar
was a man to stab you to the heart, sot over you."
"The portmanteau?" cried Johnson.
"That's gone, I reckon. They sowed you up a feather an' oyster-shell man
on a plank to heave overboard; that's what they said. They steered for
Deil's Island, an' sot the Island Parson yer to watch that you don't git
the pungy off, an' I reckon they're half-way to Princess Anne."
Joe Johnson heard no more. He released his creatures from their bonds,
took the dead body in the pungy's canoe, and gave the command:
"Row fur the open bay! We'll strike St.
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