avail. No
one would believe the former against Jaspar, and the latter was
inadmissible.

Should he carry it to Mr. Faxon, or even to Miss Emily herself, Jaspar
might obtain possession of it by some means.

His deliberations could suggest no method by which immediate justice
could be done his mistress; and the conclusion of his reflections was,
that he must place himself in a safe position before he attempted to
expose the villany of others. His mistress, he knew by the will which he
had heard De Guy read, was to be conveyed to Cincinnati. He must go to
Cincinnati--but how? This was a hard question for the faithful Hatchie
to answer; but answer it he must. He would go to New Orleans, and there
form his plan.

After waiting till the lights were extinguished in the library, he
entered the house, and obtained his money and clothing.

By the exercise of much caution, he reached New Orleans in safety,
where, by the disbursement of a small sum of money, he obtained a secure
retreat in the house of a free man, with whom he had formerly been
acquainted. His object was now to obtain a passage to Cincinnati,--a
matter not easy to accomplish, as the law against conveying blacks,
unprovided with the necessary permit, was very stringent. He could not
hope, with his limited means, to offer an acceptable bribe for this
service. To attain his object, therefore, he must resort to stratagem,
for the chances of obtaining a passage by direct means were too remote
and too perilous to be hoped for. But accident soon afforded him the
means of attaining his end.

The negro with whom he had obtained a shelter kept a small shop, and by
the grace of the authorities and his neighbors was permitted to sell
liquor, tobacco and cigars, to the steamboat cooks, stewards, sailors,
and the soldiers who thronged the city on their return from Mexico. In
the rear of this shop, and connected with it, was a small room in which
the negro lived. This room afforded a safe retreat, and in it Hatchie
had his hiding-place.

One day a little knot of men, in the faded, dilapidated garments of the
army, entered the tap-room of Hatchie's protector. They drank deeply,
and, as was their constant practice, they seated themselves at the
broken table, and commenced gambling with the negro's dirty cards for
the few dollars which remained in their possession. This amusement
terminated, as such amusements frequently do, in a fight, in which one
of the number seemed to