WHAT DOES SAM MEAN?
When the halt was called, Sam said, very much to the astonishment of the boys:--
"We must build a house here, boys."
"A house!" exclaimed Tom, "What for, pray?"
"To live in, of course. What else are houses for?"
"Yes, of course, but aren"t we going on?"
"Not at present, and it rains. We must dry our clothes to-night if we can, and keep as dry as we can while we stay here, which may be for a day or two. To do that we must have a house, but it need not be a very good one. Joe!"
"Yes, sah."
"Build a fire right here."
"Agin de big log dah, Mas" Sam?" pointing to the trunk of a great tree which had fallen in some earlier storm.
"No, build it right here. Sid, you and Bob Sharp go down into the canebrake there and get two or three dozen of the longest canes you can find."
"Green ones?" asked Bob.
"Green or dry, it doesn"t matter in the least," answered Sam. "The rest of you boys go down into the swamp off there and cut a lot of the palmetes you find there,--this sort of thing," pointing to one of the plants which grew at his feet. "Get as many of them as you can, the more the better. The fire will be burning presently and will throw a light all around."
The boys were puzzled, but they hurried away to the work a.s.signed them. Sam busied himself digging a trench on the side of the fallen tree opposite the fire. The great branches of the tree held it up many feet from the ground at the point selected, and it was Sam"s purpose to make the trunk the front of his house, building behind it, and having the fire in front. The lower part of the trunk was high enough from the ground to let all the boys, except Sid Russell, pa.s.s under without stooping; Sid had to stoop a little.
The fire blazed presently, and by the time that Sam had his ditch done the boys began to come in with loads of cane and palmetes. The palmetes are plants out of which what we call "palm-leaf fans" are made. They grow in bunches right out of the ground in many southern swamps. Each leaf is simply a palm leaf fan that needs ironing out flat, except that the edge consists of long points which are cut off in making the fans.
Sam cut two forked sticks and drove them in the ground about ten feet from the fallen tree trunk, and about ten feet apart. When driven in they were about five feet high, while the top of the trunk was perhaps eight feet from the ground. Cutting a long, straight pole, Sam laid it in the forks of his two stakes, parallel with the tree trunk. Then taking the canes he laid them from this pole to the top of the tree trunk, for rafters, placing them as close to each other as possible.
On top of them he laid the palmete leaves, taking care to lap them over each other like shingles. When the roof was well covered with them, he made the boys bring some armfuls of the long gray moss which abounds in southern forests, and lay it on top of the roof, to hold the palmete leaves in place, and to prevent them from blowing away.
For sides to the house bushes answered very well, and in less than an hour after the company halted, they were safely housed in a shed open only on the side toward the fire, and the ground within was rapidly drying, while supper was in course of preparation.
"Sam," said Tom presently.
"Well," answered Sam.
"What did you dig that big ditch for? a little one would have carried off all the water that"ll drip from the roof."
"Yes, but I dug this one to carry off other water than that."
"What water?"
"That which was already in the ground that the house is built on. You see this soil is largely composed of sand, and water runs out of it very rapidly if it has anywhere to run to. I made the ditch for it to run into, and if you"ll examine the ground here you"ll find that my trench is doing its work very well indeed."
"That"s a fac"," said Sid Russell, feeling of the sand.
"I say Sam," said Billy Bowlegs, squaring himself before Sam, with arms akimbo.
"Well, say it then," replied Sam, laughing, and a.s.suming a similar att.i.tude.
"If there is any little thing, about any sort o" thing, that you don"t happen to know, I wish you"d just oblige me by telling me what it is."
"I haven"t time, Billy," laughed Sam, "the list of things I don"t know is too long to begin this late in the evening."
"Well, you"ve made me feel like an idiot every day since we started on this tramp, by knowing all about things, and doing little things that any fool ought to have thought of, and not one of us fools did."
"Come, supper is ready," replied Sam.
After supper the boys busied themselves drying their clothes by the roaring fire of pitch pine which blazed and crackled in front of the tent, making the air within like that of an oven. While they were at it they fell to talking, of course, and it is equally a matter of course that they talked about the subject which was uppermost in their minds. They knew very well that until the house was built, and supper over, they could get nothing out of Sam. "He never will explain anything till every body is ready to listen," said Sid Russell, who had become one of Sam"s heartiest admirers. Recognizing the truth of Sid"s observation, the boys had tacitly consented to postpone all questions respecting Sam"s plans and queer manoeuvres until after supper, when there was time for him to talk and for them to listen.
Now that the time had come, the long repressed curiosity broke forth in questions.
CHAPTER XIV.
SAM CLEARS UP THE MYSTERY.
Tommy was the spokesman.
"Now then, Sam," he said, holding out his trowsers toward the fire to dry them, "tell us all about it."
"I can"t," replied Sam.
"Why not?"
"Because I don"t know all about it myself."
"Well, what do you mean by building this shed?"
"Don"t call it a shed, Tom," said Billy Bowlegs, "it"s a mansion, and these are our broad acres all around here."
"Yes, and the alligators down in the swamp there are our cattle," said Sam.
"And here"s our fowls," said Billy, slapping at the mosquitoes, "game ones they are too, ain"t they?"
"Stop your nonsense," said Sid Russell, "I want to hear Sam"s explanation. Tell us, Sam, what did you build the shanty for?"
"To live in while it rains, to be sure."
"Yes, but how long are we going to stay here?"
"I don"t know."
"Well then, why are we to stop here at all?" asked Tom, "and what have you been thinking about all the afternoon? You didn"t open your head after it began raining, until we got here; you were working out something, and this halt means that you"ve worked it out. What is it?