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"Yes, I have heard it for the last ten minutes, Mr. Stewart," he answered quietly. "It is old Polete preaching to the niggers. I have often heard their so-called witch men preach. It is always in a singsong just like that." As we drew nearer, I perceived that this was true, for I could catch the tones of the speaker's voice, and in a few minutes could distinguish his words.
His shirt was stained, apparently from a wound in his breast, but most horrible of all was a circular, reeking spot on the crown of his head from which the scalp had been stripped. It needed no second glance to tell me that Polete had been in the hands of the Indians.
"Perhaps we are," he answered doubtfully. "What is your plan, sir?" "Polete will hold a meeting to-night over there in the woods. Well, we will be present at the meeting." He looked at me without saying a word. "Our visit will probably not be very welcome," I continued, "but I believe it will produce the desired effect. Will you go with me?"
No Frenchman goes to war except in a white uniform." They were all silent for a moment, and I saw them eyeing Polete distrustfully. But he was foaming at the mouth with fury. "A lie!" he screamed. "A lie, same's de uddah. Don' yo' see what we mus' do? Kill 'em! Kill 'em, an' nobody else'll evah know!" That low growling which I had heard before again ran through the crowd. I must play my last card.
But the boy only shook his head and sobbed the more. "Ef he's a-killed," he cried, "his ha'nt 'll come back fo' me." I saw in a moment what the boy was afraid of. It was not of old Polete in the flesh, but in the spirit. I thought for a moment.
By this time Sam had partially recovered his wits, and being convinced that it was Polete in the flesh, not in the spirit, brought some water from a spring at the roadside. I bathed Polete's head as well as I could, and washed the blood from his face. Tearing open his shirt, I saw that blood was slowly welling from an ugly wound in his breast.
Negroes to the number of at least a hundred and fifty were gathered about a pile of logs on which Polete was mounted. He was shouting in a monotone, his voice rising and falling in regular cadence, his eyes closed, his head tilted back, his face turned toward the moon, whose light silvered his hair and beard and gave a certain majesty to his appearance.
He began to whimper. "I'll tell yo', Mas' Tom," he stuttered, "but yo' mus' n' hurt d' witch man." "Who is this witch man?" I demanded. "Ole uncle Polete." "Polete's no witch man. Why, Sam, you 've known him all your life. He's nothing but an ordinary old nigger. He's been on the plantation twenty or thirty years. All that he needs is a good whipping."
I waved them away with my hand, and they slunk off by twos and threes until all of them had disappeared in the shadow of the wood. "And now, what shall we do with this cur?" asked Long, in a low voice, at my elbow. I turned and saw that he had old Polete gripped by the collar. "He tried to run away," he added, "but I thought you might have something to say to him."
"Nothin' could n' been no wo'se 'n what I went frough. Kep' 'long d' ribbah, laike yo' said, but could n' git nothin' t' eat only berries growin' in d' woods. Got mighty weak, 'n' den las' night met d' Injuns." "Last night!" I cried. "Where, Polete?" "Obah dah 'long d' ribbah," he answered faintly.
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