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Updated: June 17, 2025
They shall puzzle themselves bald-headed over it," he whispered. Upstairs we stopped long enough to return the keys to Eb's desk. Our friend still had his precious banjo under his arm. We had to go cautiously in the dark, as we dared to light only one match, and that we kept covered as well as we could.
The milking done, I sat on Uncle Eb's knee in the door-yard with all the rest of that household, hearing many tales of the wilderness, and of robbery and murder on Paradise Road. I got the impression that it was a country of unexampled wickedness and ferocity in men and animals.
Else I fear my youthful memory would have served me poorly for a chronicle of my childhood so exact and so extended as this I have written. Uncle Eb's hair was white now and the voices of the swift and the panther had grown mild and tremulous and unsatisfactory and even absurd. Time had tamed the monsters of that imaginary wilderness and I had begun to lose my respect for them.
There was a wicked rolling of Uncle Eb's eyes while he spoke. Evidently from the looks of the sportsmen he guessed immediately what had been the result of their excursion. "No luck and no buck to-night!" answered Garst. "But don't roast us, Uncle Eb. Get us something to eat quicker than lightning or we'll go for you at least we would if we weren't entirely played out.
'Course if it had been some feller who was inclined to git on a tear and raise thunder, I'd 'a' jest gone out and muckled onto him and shoved him into the lockup. But I did kinder hate to lock Eli up. "I went over to Uncle Eb's lookin' for him, and there was Eben out in the woodshed a-snoozin' on a hoss blanket. Took me 'bout fifteen minutes to wake him up.
For at this crisis Tiger's shrill bugle-call resounded without, giving warning of an attack on the camp. The thing, whatever it was, scrambled from the roof, and with a strange, shrill cry of one note made towards the woods. The dog followed it, barking for all he was worth. Now, too, Uncle Eb's booming "Whoop-ee!" was heard.
During the first half-dozen miles of the way, though each one manfully did his best to be lively, a sense of loss made their fun flat and pointless. Royal's tear-away tongue, his brothers' racket, Joe's racy talk, Uncle Eb's kind, dark face, and more than all, Doc's companionship, which was as tonic to the hearts of those who travelled with him, were missed.
"That air nice, Tessie," he returned admiringly. "Ye be a pert brat, you be!" Tess paused a moment or two. "'Satisfied," she hesitated, going back mentally to her former unspoken query, "do ye know the Waldstrickers?" Longman nodded. "I knowed the old man who was murdered young Eb's father. Made some stir in town when he got shot!" "Eb's been home quite a while now," observed Tess thoughtfully.
Over the camp-fire was stooping a bright-eyed, muscular fellow, whose dress somewhat resembled Uncle Eb's, but who had no negro blood in his veins. He was frying meat; and such tempting whiffs mingled with the steam which floated up from his pan, that Dol's nostrils twitched, and his hungry longing grew almost unbearable as he inhaled them.
She presented a cool cheek for the customary kiss of greeting and helped him out of his extra wraps. "Take off your coat, dear, and come into the library," she urged. "The man told you about Elsie? But Eb's sure to find her. I'll see about something to eat while you're getting thawed out."
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