The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-03-03

face, l thought. The Pater was so mac
 that he drove him off despite my plead
 ings. Mush ran to a safe distance an , the turning about sat down an gazee back at the house, l would have gone
 to him, for something told me that il
 was his voice that had given us warn
 ing the night before, but father for bade me and I obeyed reluctantly Al that afternoon Mush sat there in the
 dusty lane looking longingly at us, an when night came it left him there. Jin, and durst not disobey father, but Zeke who knew more about animale thar
 father gave him credit for, took a ham
 bone and hunk of pone bread down
 to Mush in the lane after dark and fed
 him. That night father sat on the
 porch with his gun by him. Three of the niggers slept in the barn, for father
 feared an attempt to burn the house.
 His suspicious fell upon this discharged
 nigger at once and before noon that
 day after the clover stacks burned he
 had given the nigger's description to
 the sheriff of our county. Nothing hap
 pened that night or on the next, and
 the place got quiet on the surface again,
 though nobody was easy. A search by
 the sheriff and his men had proved
 that this nigger, who was stranger,
 was employed nowhere thereabouts and
 further than that he had not been seen
 to leave the county.
 "On the third day late in the after
 noon, Jim an I saw Mush appear in
 the lane, and he sat down an gazed at
 us as he had before. Zeke had told the
 Pater of the ham bone, so when we told
 him of Mush's presence, the Pater only
 laughed an said that Mush had come for another bite. We demurred an
 mother took sides with us but the Pater | was deep in his plans with the sheriff
 an would not listen. Jim an I stayed
 awake that night as long as we could,
 feeling sure that some thing would hap
 pen, an sure enough it did. I heard
 the clock downstairs strike ten and was
 about to drop into doze when that
 hound began to bay again. He was
 nearer this time an knew that it was
 Mush. Jim woke up an We were so
 scared that we crept clear under the
 bed covers. We could hear father tramping around downstairs. We heard
 Ieke an the other niggers talking in
 the yard an then they all crept away. l We went to sleep, but at midnight,
 when we were awakened by the re- turn to the house of lather an the nig- gers, we crept to the head of the stairs and listened. Zeke had found some huge footprints in the meadow road an
 had seen Mush following the party at a respectful distance
 'The next morning the Pater went out to look the place over an found that some one had girdled half of the apple trees in the orhard, an he rode off on old Selim to town to find the sheriff. All that afternoon the neigh bors rode up offering to form a posse, an at last the arrangements were made. The men were to meet the next morning, if, as Zeke suggested an the farmers agreed, anything at all suspicious oc- cured that night. Nothing happened, however, but the next morning we learned that Judge Spence had found two of his calves lying dead in his pound with their threats cut. At once the farmers Were assembled an parties of armed searchers were sent out in all directions, but nothing was found But tell you that if any strange nigger had happened in their way he would have fared badly. So intense was the excitement that even the townspeople 1 went about armed and there was hardly | a man about there who dared to go to | bed at night. That Judge Spence's | oVerseer had seen a nigger answering | to the description of our discharged | nigger on the Judges place a week be- | fore an had driven him off at the mug zle of the Judges gun convinced every one that our nigger was the miscreant | an that he was getting revenge for fancied injuries
 Tn two days more everything was quiet as far as further depredations was concerned. But Zeke said that he had seen Mush in the woods several times an that until that dog either dis appeared or gave him some sign of dan ger was past he would not believe it. events proved that Zeke was right. It was Saturday night an we were at supper. I sat facing the window that looked toward Judge Spence's place when suddenly Mushs ugly splotched face appeared at the window an his paws struck the pane as he leaped up from the floor of the porch, too evidently in a determined effort to attract out attention. Father ran out an we followed to find Mush standing in the walk before the house looking back over his shoulder with that same half-human look on his face. At the sight of us he lifted his nose into the air an emitted a long, hair raising howl Then he leaped the fence an ran across the meadow in the direction 0f the woods. His howl brought the niggers up from the quarters headed oy Zeke, who declared that something would happen that night Some of the 1iggers were ordered to go an summon Judge Spece an the next nearest neigh DOT, an they went off grumbling. Fa- ! her was afraid to leave mother an us ; boys at the house, so till that he could , 10 was to wait after leaving three of he niggers to sleep in the barn as be- ore. We boys we're put to bed, but we 'pent most of teh evening at the head If the stairs, listening, Neither Judge S Spence nor the other man came, though , ather waited for them until nearly s midnight. At last mother came up- f tairs an Jim and I scurried off to bed. We never knew what woke us up r long at o'clock in the morning, but & ve woke an and saw the bright light Y hining in our windows of a fire. Just V hen mother came into our room an q