I
got nothing worse than a black eye, but the man I had rescued bled from
some ugly cuts which I had much ado stanching. He shook hands with me
gravely when I had done, and vanished into the thicket. He was a Seneca
Indian, and I wondered what one of that house was doing in the
Tidewater.
Mercer told me his name. "Shalah will take you to the man you ken. Do
whatever he tells you, Mr. Garvald, for this is a job in which you're
nothing but a bairn." We pushed off, the Indian taking the oars, and in
five minutes James Town was lost in the haze.
On the Surrey shore we picked up a breeze, and with the ebbing tide
made good speed down the estuary. Shalah the Indian had the tiller, and
I sat luxuriously in the bows, smoking my cob pipe, and wondering what
the next week held in store for me. The night before I had had qualms
about the whole business, but the air of morning has a trick of firing
my blood, and I believe I had forgotten the errand which was taking me
to the Carolina shores. It was enough that I was going into a new land
and new company. Last night I had thought with disfavour of Red Ringan
the buccaneer; that morning I thought only of Ninian Campbell, with
whom I had forgathered on a Glasgow landing.
My own thoughts kept me silent, and the Indian never opened his mouth.
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