Phil knew that Tony must have discovered this significant movement, and believed it his duty to arouse the one who might be depended on to meet the situation.

Could it be some wild animal that was trying to get in at their provisions? Listening, Phil believed he could catch the sound of half suppressed breathing. Then the fumbling began again, as though a body were being drawn under the canvas curtain.

It was time he were acting. So he allowed his fingers to give those of Tony a reassuring squeeze; after which he reached out his arm. His faithful Marlin must be there on the floor of the cockpit, just where he had placed it before lying down. And when he felt the familiar sensation of the cold steel barrel, he knew he had the situation well in hand.

Suddenly a wild cry arose. It had come from the lips of Tony, as Phil instantly understood; and was immediately followed by a threshing sound, as of two bodies rolling and scrambling about on the forward deck of the little cruiser.

Evidently the fearless little swamp lad had thrown himself on the intruder, whom his keen eyes had made out to be a human being, and not a panther, as Phil had at one time suspected might prove to be the case.

Phil immediately scrambled off his seat and to his feet. It was not actually dark under the cover, for the moon still shone. He could just manage to see the tumbling figures on the deck, as Tony clung to the unknown intruder with the tenacity of a cat.

Larry had rolled into the cockpit, and was trying his best to disengage himself from his blanket, which he had somehow managed to get twisted around his bulky figure. So far as any help from that quarter might go, there was no use expecting it; for Larry was certainly in a dreadful panic, not knowing what it all meant; and perhaps thinking that he was about to be kidnapped.

“Don’t hit me, massa; I gives in, ‘deed an’ ’deed I does!” wailed a voice that could only belong to a terrified negro.

“Lie still, you!” cried Phil, thinking it best to take part in the row. “I’ve got you covered with a gun, and can blow the top of your head off. Not another move, now, d’ye hear!”

Of course the intruder had no means of knowing that those in the tied-up motor boat were mere boys. He heard the one word “gun,” and that settled the matter.

Phil thought fast. He had no doubt but that this fellow must indeed be the man the sheriff and his posse were hunting with hounds. He was an escaped convict, from the turpentine camp, where the chain gang worked out their various sentences under the rifles of the guards.

Perhaps after temporarily eluding his pursuers the fellow had happened on the boat as it lay there alongside the bank. He was possibly nearly starved; and rendered desperate by his condition had determined to attempt to steal some food, taking his very life in his hands in order to do so.

Phil knew just where a lantern lay. And he always carried plenty of matches on his person, so as to be provided in case he became lost in the wilderness at any time.

So he now decided to have some light on the subject. At the crackling of his match the negro uttered a low whine, and began to struggle slightly again, possibly fearing that he was about to be shot.

“Keep still, now!” cried Tony, knocking the fellow’s head smartly on the planks of the deck; for he was sprawled out on the intruder’s chest.

Phil, having succeeded in lighting the lantern, held it up. The first thing he saw was the frightened face of the escaped convict. Somehow it sent a pang through the heart of the boy, for he had never in all his life looked on a human countenance that was stamped with suffering as that black one seemed to be.

“Let him up, Tony; I’ve got the gun, and will keep him covered!” he said.

The swamp boy obeyed. Perhaps he hardly thought it wise of Phil to act as he did, for it might be noticed that the first act of Tony was to pick up the hatchet, and keep it handy.

Larry had finally succeeded in unwinding that blanket from around his person. He was staring at them as though he could hardly believe the whole thing were not a nightmare.

“Sit up, you!” Phil repeated; and the negro obeyed.

It was plain that astonishment was beginning to share the element of fear in his face, when he saw that his captors were three half-grown boys instead of gruff men. And perhaps for the first time a glimmer of wild hope began to struggle for existence in the oppressed heart of the runaway.

“What’s your name?” asked Phil, sternly.

“Pete Smith, sah,” replied the other, in a quavering tone.

“You escaped from the convict camp, and it was you they were hunting with the dogs, wasn’t it?” the boy went on.

“Reckons as how ’twar, sah.”

“How long ago did you run away?” Phil continued, bent on finding out all the circumstances connected with the case before deciding what to do.

“I dunno, ’zactly, sah. Mout a ben six days. ’Pears tuh me like it ben de longes’ time eber. Ain’t hed hardly a t’ing tuh eat in all dat time, massa. Jest gnawin’ in heah, an’ makin’ me desprit. Clar tuh goodness I knowed I must git somethin’, or it was sure all ober wid me. ‘Scuse me, sah, foh breakin’ in disaway. I’se dat hungry I c’d eat bran! But if so be yuh on’y lets me go I’ll neber kim back ag’in neber.”

“But you would get something to eat if you gave yourself up to the sheriff?”

The negro shuddered.

“I sooner die in de swamp dan do dat, honey,” he said, between his white teeth. “Dey got a grudge ag’in me ober dar in de turpentine camp, ‘case I took de part ob a pore sick niggah what was bein’ whipped, ’case he couldn’t wuk. Dey says it’s laziness, but I knowed better. He died arter dat. But de head keeper, he got it in foh me, an’ he make it hard. I runned away at de fust chanct; an’ I jest shorely knows dat he next door tuh kill me if he gits me back.”

“What were you there for?” asked Phil, feeling more kindly toward the wretched fugitive after hearing what he said, even though it may not have been wholly true.

“’Case I war a fool, massa; I ’mits dat,” returned the other, humbly. “Cudn’t nohow leab de juice alone. I libed in Tallahassee, an’ uster be a ‘spectable pusson till I gits drinkin’. Den I got inter a row, when a man was hurted bad. Dey sent me to de camp foh a yeah; an’ it ain’t half up yit. But I’se gwine tuh gib dem de slip, er drap down in de swamp, dat’s what.”

“Larry,” called out Phil, “wasn’t there a lot of stuff left over from supper?”

“Right you are, Phil. Shall I get it out?” asked the other, whose heart had been touched by what he heard; for Larry was a sympathetic sort of a chap, who could not bear to witness suffering, and might be easily deceived by any schemer.

“Yes,” Phil went on, quietly. “This poor fellow is pretty hungry. We’ll feed him first; and while he eats decide what we had ought to do about his case.”

“Oh! bress yuh foh dat, young massa!” exclaimed the man who had been chased by the dogs and the sheriff’s posse. “I done nebber forgits yuh, nebber. An’ if so be I is lucky enuff tuh git out ob dis scrape I ‘clar tuh goodness I nebber agin touch a single drap o’ de bug juice. It done gets me in dis trouble foh keeps, an’ it ain’t nebber ag’in gwine tuh knock me down!”

“That sounds all right, Pete,” remarked Phil, “if only you can keep your word. If you got clear you could never go back to Tallahassee again?”

“No sah, not ’less I sarve my time out. It’s disaway, sah. I done got a brudder ober near Mobile, an’ I war athinkin’ dat if on’y I cud get away I’d go tuh him. Den in time he’d send foh my wife and de chillen tuh come ober.”

“Oh! then you have a family, have you? How many children, Pete?” asked Phil.

“Seben, sah, countin’ de twins as is on’y piccaninnies yet.”

“Good gracious!” exclaimed Larry, who had been eagerly listening while getting the leftover food out of the place where he had placed it. “What a crowd! And how could they get a living all the six months you’ve been in the turpentine camp, Pete?”

“Dunno, sah,” replied the negro; “specks as how Nancy she dun hab tak in de washin’ ag’in. Ain’t dun nothin’ ob de sort dis ten yeahs; but she kin do hit right smart, sah.”

That was the last word Pete could be expected to speak for some time; for he was busily engaged stuffing himself with the food Larry thrust before him.

It was a singular sight, and one that Phil would doubtless often recall with a lively sense of humor. The lantern lighted up the tent of the motor boat, showing the emaciated black devouring the food about like a starving wolf might be expected to act; and the three watching boys, Phil still gripping his Marlin, Tony the hatchet, and Larry another tin dish with more “grub.”

Meanwhile Phil was wondering what they ought to do. He did not like to break the law; but it seemed to him that in this case he would be amply justified in assisting the runaway convict. He had surely worked long enough to have served as atonement for his crime; and the call of those seven little children was very loud in Phil’s ears.

So he made up his mind that he would place a small amount in Pete’s hand before sending him away, besides some more food. And he might at the same time be given a hint that if he only headed directly south along the river, the sheriff would not be apt to follow him far, since he dared not tempt the terrible McGee by infringing on the territory of the squatter chieftain.

So they waited for the hungry man to eat his fill. And Pete, now that he no longer felt the pangs of approaching starvation, looked at Phil out of the corners of his eyes, as though trying to guess what the “young massa” was planning to do about disposing of his case.