When the Swamp Dragoons reached the place where I was standing, they gathered about me, and looked inquiringly at Tom Mason, as if waiting for him to say something. The latter advanced with a grin on his countenance, peered sharply into my face, and then looked at me from head to foot, as if taking my exact measure.

When he had completed his examination, he stepped back, and striking his boots with his riding-whip, said:

“Do you remember what I told you the last time I saw you, Mark Coleman? I said I was going to make things exceedingly lively for you this winter, didn’t I? Well, I think I have done it. You can thank me for every thing that has happened to you.”

“It’s him, then, is it?” exclaimed Barney. 181“Them fellers look as near alike as two peas, an’ I was a’most afeared we had gobbled up the wrong chap.”

“And so you have,” I replied. “I am not Mark Coleman, and Tom Mason knows it very well. My name is Joe.”

“No, I reckon not,” returned Barney, with a most provoking laugh. “Tommy has knowed you fur years an’ years, an’ so have we; an’ you can’t pull the wool over our eyes in no sich way as that ar’!”

“You don’t know me any better than I know myself, do you? If Mark had been in my place, you never would have captured him.”

“Wouldn’t? Why not?”

“Because he would have been too smart for you. He would have whipped you and Jake and Jim so badly that your mothers wouldn’t know you.”

“Wal, now, we’d ’a kept the skeeters off’n him while he was a-doin’ it,” said Jake, who was angry in an instant at the imputation I had cast upon his prowess. “But you can jest hush up that sass, ’cause we ain’t a-goin’ to stand it from you.”

182“No, we hain’t,” chimed in Barney. “We’re a-goin’ to pay you fur it now, an’ while we are about it, we’ll settle with you fur all the other mean things you have done.”

“How are you going to do it?”

“Every one of us is goin’ to give you ten good licks with this yere,” replied Barney, flourishing his riding-whip in the air. “Untie his hands an’ pull off his jacket!”

Seventy blows with a rawhide! Wasn’t that a pleasing prospect? How would you have felt if you had been in my place? Would you have taken the whipping quietly?

I was fully determined that I would not. I knew that I had never done any of the Swamp Dragoons an injury, and even if I had, they had no right to deal out such punishment as this to me.

“That’s the idee!” said Barney, as Jake and one of his confederates pulled off my coat after untying my hands. “Now loosen up on his feet. That b’iled shirt o’ yourn’ll have marks on it afore we are done with you, won’t it, Tommy?”

“That’s just what’s the matter!” replied 183Tom, hitting his boots another cut with his whip. “You don’t associate with boys who steal and tell falsehoods, do you? Ten good blows with this rawhide will pay you for saying that!”

Why the Swamp Dragoons were so stupid as to untie my feet, when there was no necessity for it, I do not know; but they did, and it gave me an opportunity to fight for my liberty.

I improved it on the instant. Jake must have been astonished at the weight of the blow that was planted squarely in his face, and so was I; for it drove him against Tom Mason with such force that the latter was knocked fairly off his feet.

This opened a way through the ranks of my enemies, and, before they could lift a finger, to detain me, I had leaped over the prostrate forms, and was running through the bushes at the top of my speed.

I was quite as much astonished at what I had done as the Swamp Dragoons must have been.

I made the attempt at escape, not because I 184thought it would be successful, but for the reason that I wished to postpone the moment of my punishment as long as possible.

I had fully expected to be knocked down or tripped up immediately; but, having accomplished this much, I began to hope that, aided by the darkness, I might elude my enemies altogether.

This hope, however, was short-lived. There were Indians and bloodhounds behind me, and in less than a minute both were on my trail.

As soon as the Swamp Dragoons found their tongues, they uttered loud yells of surprise and alarm, and called upon the men about the fire for assistance.

“What’s the matter over thar?” demanded the gruff voice of Luke Redman.

“Mark Coleman!” gasped the leader of the Dragoons. “We ketched him, but he has got away. Thar he is, runnin’ through the cane like a skeered turkey!”

“Turn your dogs loose on him!” shouted Luke. “Come, Injuns, do something fur us!”

There was no need that Luke Redman should call upon Pete and his companions for help. 185The former, at least, had reasons for wishing to prevent my escape, and as soon as he found out what was going on, he set up a whoop and started in pursuit.

I did not waste time in looking back at him, but my ears told me that he was coming, and that he was gaining on me at every step.

I heard the fierce yelps the hounds gave when they found my trail, and knew they would overtake me if the Indians did not. They might even tear me in pieces before their masters could come up to rescue me; but fearing the rawhide more than the teeth of the dogs, I kept straight ahead, doing some of the best running I ever did in my life, until a heavy hand was laid upon my collar, and I was jerked backward and thrown upon the ground.

“Ugh!” grunted Pete. “White boy good runner—very good runner; but no match for Injun. S’pose I put dogs on him!”

The Swamp Dragoons and the bloodhounds came up at this moment, and I feared that between them both I should be severely dealt with.

The dogs seemed determined to bite me, Jake 186and Tom were bent on taking revenge on me for knocking them down, while Pete, although he at first made some show of protecting me, was more than half inclined to allow them to act their pleasure.

There is no telling what might have happened had it not been for Luke Redman, whose stern voice sent the hounds cowering into the bushes, and arrested the hands that were uplifted to strike me.

“Get out, you whelps!” he roared. “Quit your foolin’, boys. We’ve no time to waste in settlin’ with him now. Fetch up the hosses, an’ let’s start fur hum.”

In obedience to these commands, my captors ceased their hostile demonstrations, and began preparations for instant departure. Barney and Jake busied themselves in tying my hands; the rest of the Dragoons brought up the horses belonging to the attacking party, which were hidden in the swamp a short distance from the camp, while Pete and the rest of the half-breeds ransacked the shanty, and took possession of the guns, saddles and hunting-horns which our fellows had left behind them.

187When every thing was ready for the start, Luke Redman, mounting Black Bess, rode at the head of the cavalcade, and I followed at his heels, in precisely the same situation in which the robber had been placed a few hours before—mounted on mother’s horse, with my hands bound behind my back.

“I told you somethin’ was a-goin’ to happen, an’ you laughed at me,” chuckled Luke Redman. “Now you’ll see how much fun thar is in ridin’ through a thick woods with your hands tied hard an’ fast.”

I had not gone a hundred yards from the camp before I found that there was no fun at all in it. The briers and cane were thick, and, as I could not raise my hands to protect my face, I received more than one blow and scratch that brought the tears to my eyes. But I made no complaint. Luke Redman had endured it during a journey of fifteen miles, and I thought I could endure it also.

That was my second dreary ride that night, and it was one I never wanted to take again.

What my captors were going to do with me, and in what direction they were traveling, I 188had no way of finding out, for they would not answer my questions. All I could tell was that Luke Redman took especial pains to avoid the clear ground, seeming to prefer the muddy and almost impassable bottom to the high and dry ridges; and that when day dawned, and it became light enough for me to distinguish objects about me, I found myself in a part of the swamp I had never visited before.

“Thar!” exclaimed Luke, reining in his horse on the banks of a deep bayou, and glancing back at the labyrinth of trees and bushes from which we had just emerged, “I’d like to see the man who can foller our trail. Now, Barney, you an’ Pete come here a minute.”

The persons addressed followed the robber a short distance up the bayou, and held a long consultation with him. When it was ended, Tom Mason, Luke Redman and the Swamp Dragoons dismounted, I was dragged out of my saddle, and the horses we had ridden were taken in charge by Pete and his half-breed companions, who crossed the bayou and disappeared in the woods on the opposite bank.

189Barney and his followers, in the meantime, were hunting about among the bushes which grew along the edge of the stream, and presently a large canoe was brought to light.

My face must have betrayed the interest with which I watched these proceedings, for Luke Redman said:

“I’m an old fox, an’ I think I have managed this thing jest about right. I know the men in the settlement will be arter us—I shouldn’t wonder if they was on our trail this very minute—an’ they may succeed in follerin’ us arter all the trouble I’ve tuk to throw ’em off the scent. When they reach this yere bayou, they’ll see that the hosses have crossed to the other side, an’ they’ll think, in course, that we are still on their backs; but we won’t be, ’cause we’re goin’ down stream in this yere dug-out. They’ll foller the trail of the hosses, but they won’t make nothin’ by it, ’cause Pete’s an Injun, an’ knows how to fool ’em.”

“Well,” said I, “since you have seen fit to explain your movements to me, perhaps you won’t mind telling me why you are keeping me a prisoner.”

190Luke Redman rubbed his chin, and looked down at the ground in a brown study.

“I reckon I might as well tell you now as any other time,” said he, after a moment’s reflection. “I want to use you; that’s the reason I am keepin’ you here. I want to use Tommy, too, an’ that’s the reason I’m keepin’ him.”

This was the first intimation I had had of the fact that Tom Mason was held as a prisoner, and the sudden start that young gentleman gave, and the expression of surprise and alarm that settled on his face, told me as plainly as words that it was news to him also. He looked earnestly at Luke Redman, then at Barney and his companions, and said in a faltering voice:

“I came here of my own free will, and you surely do not mean to say that I can not go home again when I feel so disposed?”

“Yes, I do mean to say that very thing,” replied Luke, coolly. “You’re a prisoner, same as this other feller.”

Tom staggered back as if some one had aimed a blow at him, his face grew deathly 191pale, and he looked the very picture of terror. In spite of all the trouble he had brought upon me, I pitied him from the bottom of my heart.

For several minutes no one spoke. Tom stood staring at Luke Redman in a sort of stupid bewilderment, as if he found it impossible to grasp the full import of the words he had just heard, and the man leaned on the muzzle of Sandy Todd’s shot-gun, which he had appropriated for his own use, and stared at him in return.

“You don’t quite see through it, do you?” said the latter, at length.

“No, I don’t,” Tom almost gasped. “I can’t understand what object you have in view in keeping me here, for I shall............