cret so
momentous. He was always noted as the gayest of the working gang--his
laugh, the loudest, longest, and merriest, carried across the plantation
fields; and on this particular day, it rings with its wonted
cheerfulness.

Only during the earlier hours. When, at mid-day, a report reaches the
place where the slaves are at work, that a man has been murdered--this,
Charles Clancy--the coon-hunter, in common with the rest of the gang,
throws down his hoe; all uniting in a cry of sympathetic sorrow. For
all of them know young "Massr Clancy;" respecting, many of them loving
him. He has been accustomed to meet them with pleasant looks, and
accost them in kindly words.

The tidings produce a painful impression upon them; and from that
moment, though their task has to be continued, there is no more
cheerfulness in the cotton field. Even their conversation is hushed, or
carried on in a subdued tone; the hoes being alone heard, as their steel
blades clink against an occasional "donick."

But while his fellow-labourers are silent through sorrow, Blue Bill is
speechless from another and different cause. They only hear that young
Massr Clancy has been killed--murdered, as the report says--while he
knows how, when, where, and _by whom_. The knowledge gives him double
uneasiness; for while sorrowing as much, perhaps more than any, for
Charles Clancy's death, he has fears for his own life, with good reasons
for having them.

If by any sinister chance Massr Dick should get acquainted with the fact
of his having been witness to that rapid retreat among the trees, he,
Blue Bill, would be speedily put where his tongue could never give
testimony.

In full consciousness of his danger, he determines not to commit himself
by any voluntary avowal of what he has seen and heard; but to bury the
secret in his own breast, as also insist on its being so interred within
the bosom of his better half.

This day, Phoebe is not in the field along with the working gang; which
causes him some anxiety. The coon-hunter can trust his wife's
affections, but is not so confident as to her prudence. She may say
something in the "quarter" to compromise him. A word--the slightest
hint of what has happened--may lead to his being questioned, and
confessed; with torture, if the truth be suspected.

No wonder that during the rest of the day Blue Bill wears an air of
abstraction, and hoes the tobacco plants with a careless hand, often
chopping off