"Whar"s yo" string?" he asked, handing the pole to the still trembling little darky.
"I"ll take it," said Dan, sticking the b.u.t.t of his cane-pole in the mud. The fish slipped through his wet fingers, when Chad pa.s.sed it to him, dropped on the bank, flopped to the edge of the creek, and the three boys, with the same cry, scrambled for it-s...o...b..ll falling down on it and clutching it in both his black little paws.
"Dar now!" he shrieked. "I got him!"
"Give him to me," said Dan.
"Lemme string him," said the black boy.
"Give him to me, I tell you!" And, stringing the fish, Dan took the other pole and turned his eyes to his corks, while the pickaninny squatted behind him and Chad climbed up and sat on the bank letting his legs dangle over. When Dan caught a fish he would fling it with a whoop high over the bank. After the third fish, the lad was mollified and got over his ill-temper. He turned to Chad.
"Want to fish?"
Chad sprang down the bank quickly.
"Yes," he said, and he took the other pole out of the bank, put on a fresh wriggling worm, and moved a little farther down the creek where there was an eddy.
"Ketchin" any?" said a voice above the bank, and Chad looked up to see still another lad, taller by a head than either he or Dan-evidently the boy whom he had seen rigging a pole up at the big house on the hill.
"Oh, "bout "leven," said Dan, carelessly.
"Howdye!" said Chad.
"Howdye!" said the other boy, and he, too, stared curiously, but Chad had got used to people staring at him.
"I"m goin" over the big rock," added the new arrival, and he went down the creek and climbed around a steep little cliff, and out on a huge rock that hung over the creek, where he dropped his hook. He had no cork, and Chad knew that he was trying to catch catfish. Presently he jerked, and a yellow mudcat rose to the surface, fighting desperately for his life, and Dan and s...o...b..ll yelled crazily. Then Dan pulled out a perch.
"I got another one," he shouted. And Chad fished silently. They were making "a mighty big fuss," he thought, "over mighty little fish." If he just had a minnow an" had "em down in the mountains, "I Gonnies, he"d show"em what fishin" was!" But he began to have good luck as it was. Perch after perch he pulled out quietly, and he kept s...o...b..ll busy stringing them until he had five on the string. The boy on the rock was watching him and so was the boy near him-furtively-while s...o...b..ll"s admiration was won completely, and he grinned and gurgled his delight, until Dan lost his temper again and spoke to him sharply. Dan did not like to be beaten at anything. Pretty soon there was a light thunder of hoofs on the turf above the bank. A black pony shot around the bank and was pulled in at the edge of the ford, and Chad was looking into the dancing black eyes of a little girl with a black velvet cap on her dark curls and a white plume waving from it.
"Howdye!" said Chad, and his heart leaped curiously, but the little girl did not answer. She, too, stared at him as all the others had done and started to ride into the creek, but Dan stopped her sharply:
"Now, Margaret, don"t you ride into that water. You"ll skeer the fish."
"No, you won"t," said Chad, promptly. "Fish don"t keer nothin" about a hoss." But the little girl stood still, and her brother"s face flushed. He resented the stranger"s interference and his a.s.sumption of a better knowledge of fish.
"Mind your own business," trembled on his tongue, and the fact that he held the words back only served to increase his ill-humor and make a worse outbreak possible. But, if Chad did not understand, s...o...b..ll did, and his black face grew suddenly grave as he sprang more alertly than ever at any word from his little master. Meanwhile, all unconscious, Chad fished on, catching perch after perch, but he could not keep his eyes on his cork while the little girl was so near, and more than once he was warned by a suppressed cry from the pickaninny when to pull. Once, when he was putting on a worm, he saw the little girl watching the process with great disgust, and he remembered that Melissa would never bait her own hook. All girls were alike, he "reckoned" to himself, and when he caught a fish that was unusually big, he walked over to her.
"I"ll give this un to you," he said, but she shrank from it.
"Go "way!" she said, and she turned her pony. Dan was red in the face by this time. How did this piece of poor white trash dare to offer a fish to his sister. And this time the words came out like the crack of a whip:
"S"pose you mind your own business!"
Chad started as though he had been struck and looked around quickly. He said nothing, but he stuck the b.u.t.t of his pole in the mud at once and climbed up on the bank again and sat there, with his legs hanging over; and his own face was not pleasant to see. The little girl was riding at a walk up the road. Chad kept perfect silence, for he realized that he had not been minding his own business; still he did not like to be told so and in such a way. Both corks were shaking at the same time now.
"You got a bite," said Dan, but Chad did not move.
"You got a bite, I tell you," he said, in almost the tone he had used to s...o...b..ll, but Chad, when the small aristocrat looked sharply around, dropped his elbows to his knees and his chin into his hand-taking no notice. Once he spat dexterously into the creek. Dan"s own cork was going under:
"s...o...b..ll!" he cried-"jerk!" A fish flew over Chad"s head. s...o...b..ll had run for the other pole at command and jerked, too, but the fish was gone and with it the bait.
"You lost that fish!" said the boy, hotly, but Chad sat silent-still. If he would only say something! Dan began to think that the stranger was a coward. So presently, to show what a great little man he was, he began to tease s...o...b..ll, who was up on the bank unhooking the fish, of which Chad had taken no notice.
"What"s your name?"
"s...o...b..ll!" henchman, obediently.
"Louder!"
"S-n-o-w-b-a-l-l!"
"Louder!" The little black fellow opened his mouth wide.
"S-N-O-W-B-A-L-L!" he shrieked.
"LOUDER!"
At last Chad spoke quietly.
"He can"t holler no louder."
"What do you know about it? Louder!", and Dan started menacingly after the little darky but Chad stepped between.
"Don"t hit him!"
Now Dan had never struck s...o...b..ll in his life, and he would as soon have struck his own brother-but he must not be told that he couldn"t. His face flamed and little Hotspur that he was, he drew his fist back and hit Chad full in the chest. Chad leaped back to avoid the blow, tumbling s...o...b..ll down the bank; the two clinched, and, while they tussled, Chad heard the other brother clambering over the rocks, the beat of hoofs coming toward him on the turf, and the little girl"s cry:
"Don"t you DARE touch my brother!"
Both went down side by side with their head just hanging over the bank, where both could see s...o...b..ll"s black wool coming to the surface in the deep hole, and both heard his terrified shriek as he went under again. Chad was first to his feet.
"Git a rail!" he shouted and plunged in, but Dan sprang in after him. In three strokes, for the current was rather strong, Chad had the kinky wool in his hand, and, in a few strokes more, the two boys had s...o...b..ll gasping on the bank. Harry, the taller brother, ran forward to help them carry him up the bank, and they laid him, choking and bawling, on the gra.s.s. Whip in one hand and with the skirt of her long black riding-habit in the other, the little girl stood above, looking on-white and frightened. The hullabaloo had reached the house and General Dean was walking swiftly down the hill, with s...o...b..ll"s mammy, topped by a red bandanna handkerchief, rushing after him and the kitchen servants following.
"What does this mean?" he said, sternly, and Chad was in a strange awe at once-he was so tall, and he stood so straight, and his eye was so piercing. Few people could lie into that eye. The little girl spoke first-usually she does speak first, as well as last.
"Dan and-and-that boy were fighting and they pushed s...o...b..ll into the creek."
"Dan was teasin" s...o...b..ll," said Harry the just.
"And that boy meddled," said Dan.
"Who struck first?" asked the General, looking from one boy to the other. Dan dropped his eyes sullenly and Chad did not answer.
"I wasn"t goin" to hit s...o...b..ll," said Dan.
"I thought you wus," said Chad.
"Who struck first?" repeated the General, looking at Dan now.