come out of the wigwam.  Jim was gone!  I set up a shout--and then another--and then another one; and run this way and that in the woods, whooping and screeching; but it warn't no use--old Jim was gone.  Then I set down and cried; I couldn't help it. But I couldn't set still long.  Pretty soon I went out on the road, trying to think what I better do, and I run across a boy walking, and asked him if he'd seen a strange nigger dressed so and so, and he says: “Yes.” “Whereabouts?” says I. “Down to Silas Phelps' place, two mile below here.  He's a runaway nigger, and they've got him.  Was you looking for him?” “You bet I ain't!  I run across him in the woods about an hour or two ago, and he said if I hollered he'd cut my livers out--and told me to lay down and stay where I was; and I done it.  Been there ever since; afeard to come out.” “Well,” he says, “you needn't be afeard no more, becuz they've got him. He run off f'm down South, som'ers.” “It's a good job they got him.” “Well, I _reckon_!  There's two hunderd dollars reward on him.  It's like picking up money out'n the road.” “Yes, it is--and I could a had it if I'd been big enough; I see him _first_. Who nailed him?” “It was an old fellow--a stranger--and he sold out his chance in him for forty dollars, becuz he's got to go up the river and can't wait.  Think o' that, now!  You bet _I'd_ wait, if it was seven year.” “That's me, every time,” says I. “But maybe his chance ain't worth no more than that, if he'll sell it so cheap.  Maybe there's something ain't straight about it.” “But it _is_, though--straight as a string.  I see the handbill myself.  It tells all about him, to a dot--paints him like a picture, and tells the plantation he's frum, below Newr_leans_.  No-sirree-_bob_, they ain't no trouble 'bout _that_ speculation, you bet you.  Say, gimme a chaw tobacker, won't ye?” I didn't have none, so he left.  I went to the raft, and set down in the wigwam to think.  But I couldn't come to nothing.