ischarged the two barrels of a heavily-loaded shot-gun
directly through the negro's heart.

"You incarnate son of h--," yelled the Colonel, as he sprang on the
overseer, bore him to the ground, and wrenched the shot-gun from his
hand. Clubbing the weapon, he raised it to brain him. The movement
occupied but a second; the gun was descending, and in another instant
Moye would have met Sam in eternity, had not a brawny arm caught the
Colonel's, and, winding itself around his body, pinned his limbs to his
side so that motion was impossible. The woman, half frantic with
excitement, thrust open the door when her husband fell, and the light
which came through it revealed the face of the new-comer. But his voice,
which rang out on the night air as clear as a bugle, had there been no
light, would have betrayed him. It was Scip. Spurning the prostrate
overseer with his foot, he shouted:

"Run, you wite debble, run for your life!"

"Let me go, you black scoundrel," shrieked the Colonel, wild with rage.

"When he'm out ob reach, you'd kill him," replied the negro, as cool as
if he was doing an ordinary thing.

"I'll kill you, you black--hound, if you don't let me go," again
screamed the Colonel, struggling violently in the negro's grasp, and
literally foaming at the mouth.

"I shan't lef you gwo, Cunnel, till you 'gree not to do dat."

The Colonel was a stout, athletic man, in the very prime of life, and
his rage gave him more than his ordinary strength, but Scip held him as
I might have held a child.

"Here, Jim," shouted the Colonel to his body-servant, who just then
emerged from among the trees, "'rouse the plantation--shoot this
d-- nigger."

"Dar aint one on 'em wud touch him, massa. He'd send _me_ to de debble
wid one fist."

"You ungrateful dog," groaned his master. "Mr. K----, will you stand by
and see me handcuffed by a miserable slave?"

"The black means well, my friend; he has saved you from murder. Say he
is safe, and I'll answer for his being away in an hour."

The Colonel made one more ineffectual attempt to free himself from the
vice-like grip of the negro, then relaxing his efforts, and, gathering
his broken breath, he said, "You're safe _now_, but if you're found
within ten miles of my plantation by sunrise, by--you're a dead man."

The negro relinquished his hold, and, without saying a word, walked
slowly away.

"Jim, you--rascal," said the Colonel to that courageous darky, who was
skulking off,