"When we come in sight of him," said Frank, "let me shoot him, won't you?"

"H'm! I reckon I'll give you a shot!" muttered the man, with darkly dubious meaning.

"I wish you would," said Frank. "Our boys have two cartridges apiece given them every day now, and they practise shooting at a target. But as I am a drummer, I don't have any chance to shoot. There's your turkey now."

In fact an unmistakable gobble was just then heard farther on in the woods.

"May I take the gun and go on and shoot him?" Frank asked, with an innocent air.

And he stopped, determined now to get behind the man, if he could not obtain the gun.

The rebel laughed grimly at the idea of giving up his weapon. But the sound of the turkey, together with the boy's cool and self-possessed conduct, had so far deceived him that he no longer drove Frank inexorably before him, but permitted him to walk by his side, and even to lag a little behind.

"Gobble, obble, obble!" said the turkey, behind some bushes, still several rods off.

"Yes, that's my turkey!" said the man, ready enough to claim the unseen fowl.

"How do you know he is yours?" asked Frank.

"I know his gobble. One I had stole gobbled jest like that." And the secessionist's stern features relaxed a little.

Frank's relaxed a little, too; for, serious as his dilemma had seemed a minute since, he could not but be amused by the man's undoubting recognition of _that_ gobble.

"All turkeys make a noise alike," said Frank.

"No they don't, no they don't!" said the man, positively,--no doubt fearing a plot to get the fowl away from him, and anxious to set up his claim in season. "I reckon I know about turkeys. Hear that?"--as the sound was heard again, still at a distance. "That's my bird. I should know that gobble among five hundred."

Frank suppressed his merriment, thinking that now was his time to get away.

"Well," said he, "unless you'll sell me the bird, I don't know that there's any use of my going any farther with you."

He expected a repet.i.tion of the refusal to sell, when he would have the best excuse in the world for making his escape. But Buckley was still suspicious of some trick,--fearing, perhaps, that Frank would run off and get help to secure the turkey.

"We'll see; we'll see. Wait till we get the bird," said the man. "You've done me a good turn telling me about him, and mayhap I'll sell him to you for your honesty. But wait a bit; wait a bit."

They were fast approaching the bushes where the supposed turkey was.

"Quit, quit, quit! Gobble, obble, obble!" said the pretended fowl.

"He _must_ know now," thought Frank, with renewed apprehension; but he dared not run.

In fact, the old fellow was beginning to see that his recognition of _his_ gobbler had been premature. A patch of blue uniform was visible through the brush. The rebel stopped, and drew up his gun. As Hamlet killed Polonius for a rat, so would he kill a Yankee for a turkey.

Click! the piece was c.o.c.ked and aimed.

"Here, you old clodhopper, you; don't you shoot! don't you shoot!"

screamed Seth Tucket, rushing wildly out of the bushes just as the rebel pulled the trigger.

XII.

THE SECESSIONIST'S TURKEYS.

In the mean time the boys watching from their ambush, and seeing that the rebel had gone off with Frank, but left his dog and negro behind, armed themselves with clubs. When all was ready, Winch gave the word, and forward they dashed at the doublequick, clearing more than half the s.p.a.ce intervening between them and the barns, before they were discovered by the enemy. Then the dog bounded out with a bark, and the old negro began to "holler," and the rebel's wife and daughter ran out and screamed, and an old negress also appeared, brandishing a broom, and adding her voice to the chorus.

At this moment the report of a gun came from the direction in which the secessionist had gone off with Frank.

John Winch heard it, just as the dog met the charging party. Who was killed? Frank or Seth? John did not know, but he was frightened. He had come for fun and poultry, not for fighting and bullets. Neither was he particularly ambitions to be bitten by that monstrous dog. He lost faith in his club, and dropped it. He lost confidence in the prowess of his companions, and deserted them. In short, Jack Winch, who had been one of the most eager to engage in the adventure, took ignominiously to his heels.

He reached the thicket before venturing to look behind him. Then he saw that his comrades had frightened away the negro, beaten back the dog, and taken the turkey-pen by storm. He would now have been but too glad to join them; but it was too late. Having accomplished their undertaking, they were returning, each bringing, pendent by the legs, a flopping fowl.

It is better to be a brave man than a coward, even in a bad cause.

Fortune often favors brave men in the wrong in preference to aiding cowards in the right, for Fortune loves not a poltroon. John Winch felt at that moment that n.o.body henceforth would love or favor him, and he began to frame excuses for his shameful conduct.

"h.e.l.lo, Jack Winch," cried Ellis, coming up with a turkey in one hand and a chicken in the other, "you're a smart leader--to run away from a yelping dog like that!"

"Coward! coward!" chimed in the others, with angry contempt.

"I sprained my ankle. Didn't you know it?" said the miserable Jack, with a writhing countenance, limping.

"Sprained your granny!" exclaimed Harris. "I never saw a sprained ankle go over the ground as fast as yours did, just as we came to the dog."

"Then I heard the gun," said Jack, "and I was afraid either Seth or Frank was shot."

"Woe to the man of turkeys if they are!" said Joe, twisting the neck of his fowl to quiet it. "We'll serve him as I am serving this hen."

The boys hastened to a rendezvous they had appointed with the absent ones, followed by Jack at a very creditable pace, considering his excruciating lameness.

As yet, neither Frank nor Seth had been shot. The charge of buck shot fired from the rebel fowling-piece had entered the bushes just as the blue uniform left them. But the secessionist c.o.c.ked the other barrel of his piece immediately, with the intention of making up for the error of his first aim.

"Shoot me," shouted Seth, "and you'll be swinging from that limb in five minutes!"

The man hesitated, glancing quickly about for those who were expected to put Seth's threat into execution.

"I've twenty fellows with me," added Seth, "and they'll string you up in no time, by darn!"

The secessionist was not so much impressed by the rather slender oath with which Seth clinched his speech, as by the sharp and earnest tone in which the whole was uttered,--Seth walking savagely up to him as he spoke. All the while, the alarm raised by the negro, and the dog, and the women, was sounding in the man's ears.

"They're after my turkeys! This is your trick, boy!" and he sprang upon Frank, lifting his gun as if to level him to the earth.

But Seth sprang after him, and seized the weapon before it descended.

That green down-easter was cool as if he had been at a game of ball. He was an athletic youth, and he readily saw that Buckley, though a st.u.r.dy farmer, was no match for him. He pushed him back, shouting shrilly, at the same time, in the words of his favorite poet,--

"'Now, if thou strik'st him but one blow, I'll hurl thee from the brink as far as ever peasant pitched a bar!'"

This strange form of salutation astonished the rebel even more than the rough treatment he received at the hands of the vigorous and poetical Tucket. He saw that it was no time to stay and parley. He knew that his turkeys were going, and, muttering a parting malediction at Frank, he set off at a run to protect his poultry-yard.