I stopped short, throwing her hand aside, snarling: "What devil's game
are you up to, wench?" Instantly the smiling siren was changed to a blood-mad jungle cat. Her
eyes flamed murderously, her red lips writhed in a snarl as she leaped
back, crying out shrilly. A rush of bare feet answered her call. The
first faint light of dawn struck through the branches, revealing my
assailants, three gaunt black giants. I saw the gleaming whites of
their eyes, their bare glistening teeth, the sheen of naked steel in
their hands. My first bullet crashed through the head of the tallest man, knocking
him dead in full stride. My second pistol snapped--the cap had somehow
slipped from the nipple. I dashed it into a black face, and as the
man fell, half stunned, I whipped out my bowie knife and closed with
the other. I parried his stab and my counter-stroke ripped across his
belly-muscles. He screamed like a swamp-panther and made a wild grab
for my knife wrist, but I struck him in the mouth with my clenched left
fist, and felt his lips split and his teeth crumble under the impact
as he reeled backward, his knife waving wildly. Before he could regain
his balance I was after him, thrusting, and got home under his ribs. He
groaned and slipped to the ground in a puddle of his own blood. I wheeled about, looking for the other. He was just rising, blood
streaming down his face and neck. As I started for him he sounded a
panicky yell and plunged into the underbrush. The crashing of his blind
flight came back to me, muffled with distance. The girl was gone. _2. The Stranger on Tularoosa_


The curious glow that had first showed me the quadroon girl had
vanished. In my confusion I had forgotten it. But I did not waste
time on vain conjecture as to its source, as I groped my way back to
the road. Mystery had come to the pinelands and a ghostly light that
hovered among the trees was only part of it. My horse snorted and pulled against his tether, frightened by the smell
of blood that hung in the heavy damp air. Hoofs clattered down the
road, forms bulked in the growing light. Voices challenged. "Who's that? Step out and name yourself, before we shoot!" "Hold on, Esau!" I called. "It's me--Kirby Buckner!" "Kirby Buckner, by thunder!" ejaculated Esau McBride, lowering his
pistol. The tall rangy forms of the other riders loomed behind him. "We heard a shot," said McBride. "We was ridin' patrol on the roads
around Grimesville like we've been ridin' every night for a week
now--ever since they killed Ridge Jackson." "Who killed Ridge Jackson?" "The swamp-niggers. That's all we know. Ridge come out of the woods
early one mornin' and knocked at Cap'n Sorley's door. Cap'n says he was
the color of ashes. He hollered for the Cap'n for God's sake to let him
in, he had somethin' awful to tell him. Well, the Cap'n started down to
open the door, but before he'd got down the stairs he heard an awful
row among the dogs outside, and a man screamed he reckoned was Ridge. And when he got to the door, there wasn't nothin' but a dead dog layin'
in the yard with his head knocked in, and the others all goin' crazy. They found Ridge later, out in the pines a few hundred yards from the
house. From the way the ground and the bushes was tore up, he'd been
dragged that far by four or five men. Maybe they got tired of haulin'
him along. Anyway, they beat his head into a pulp and left him layin'
there." "I'll be damned!" I muttered. "Well, there's a couple of niggers lying
back there in the brush. I want to see if you know them. I don't." *       *       *       *       *

A moment later we were standing in the tiny glade, now white in the
growing dawn. A black shape sprawled on the matted pine needles, his
head in a pool of blood and brains. There were wide smears of blood on
the ground and bushes on the other side of the little clearing, but
the wounded black was gone. McBride turned the carcass with his foot. "One of them niggers that came in with Saul Stark," he muttered. "Who the devil's that?" I demanded. "Strange nigger that moved in since you went down the river last time. Come from South Carolina, he says. Lives in that old cabin in the
Neck--you know, the shack where Colonel Reynolds' niggers used to live." "Suppose you ride on to Grimesville with me, Esau," I said, "and tell
me about this business as we ride. The rest of you might scout around
and see if you can find a wounded nigger in the brush." They agreed without question; the Buckners have always been tacitly
considered leaders in Canaan, and it came natural for me to offer
suggestions. Nobody gives _orders_ to white men in Canaan. "I reckoned you'd be showin' up soon," opined McBride, as we rode
along the whitening road. "You usually manage to keep up with what's
happenin' in Canaan." "What _is_ happening?" I inquired. "I don't know anything. An old
black woman dropped me the word in New Orleans that there was trouble. Naturally I came home as fast as I could. Three strange niggers waylaid
me----" I was curiously disinclined to mention the woman. "And now you
tell me somebody killed Ridge Jackson. What's it all about?" "The swamp-niggers killed Ridge to shut his mouth," announced McBride. "That's the only way to figure it. They must have been close behind
him when he knocked on Cap'n Sorley's door. Ridge worked for Cap'n
Sorley most of his life; he thought a lot of the old man. Some kind of
deviltry's bein' brewed up in the swamps, and Ridge wanted to warn the
Cap'n. That's the way I figure it." "Warn him about what?" "We don't know," confessed McBride. "That's why we're all on edge. It
must be an uprisin'." That word was enough to strike chill fear into the heart of any
Canaan-dweller. The blacks had risen in 1845, and the red terror of
that revolt was not forgotten, nor the three lesser rebellions before
it, when the slaves rose and spread fire and slaughter from Tularoosa
to the shores of Black River. The fear of a black uprising lurked for
ever in the depths of that forgotten back-country; the very children
absorbed it in their cradles. "What makes you think it might be an uprising?" I asked. "The niggers have all quit the fields, for one thing. They've all got
business in Goshen. I ain't seen a nigger nigh Grimesville for a week. _The town-niggers have pulled out._"

In Canaan we still draw a distinction born in antebellum days. "Town-niggers" are descendants of the house-servants of the old days,
and most of them live in or near Grimesville. There are not many,
compared to the mass of "swamp-niggers" who dwell on tiny farms along
the creeks and the edge of the swamps, or in the black village of
Goshen, on the Tularoosa. They are descendants of the field-hands of
other days, and, untouched by the mellow civilization which refined
the natures of the house-servants, they remain as primitive as their
African ancestors. "Where have the town-niggers gone?" I asked. "Nobody knows. They lit out a week ago. Probably hidin' down on Black
River.