“But I see them! They are down there by that car, now. Do you see? O, I’m watching them! They’ll be sharp if they take me alive!”
The terminus of the Market Street and West Philadelphia horse railway is at the building then used as a hospital, and a car arrived and departed every forty minutes till eleven o’clock. At this time, there was one standing some fifty yards from the building, awaiting its time to depart for the depot in West Philadelphia.
“Yes, I do see them now,” I said, thinking it better to humor him; “but it is very plain they have concluded you are not here, for they are getting on that car to leave.”
“O, I know their tricks!” he replied, quickly. “They only want to make me think they are gone, so that I will go to sleep, and they can come and take me easily. But they don’t catch me that way! I should think not! Ha! Ha! Ha!”
“Really, Thomas,” said I, persuasively, “I believe they intend to go. Go to bed, and I will watch for you. If they do not leave on that car when it goes, and offer to come this way, I will wake you and tell you. Depend on me.”
“I will, then; but, mind, don’t let ’em get near. They’re sly as foxes. Watch ’em.”
“Don’t fear,” I replied. “Go to bed, and I will wake you in good time if I see them coming.”
Thereupon Thomas, who was a large strong man of thirty years, returned somewhat reluctantly to his bed, while some of the other boys of the “ward” began to wake up, and swear moderately because their slumbers had been disturbed. The murmur soon subsided, however, Thomas seemed to sleep, all grew quiet, and I lay down again.
I was just getting into a comfortable doze, when Thomas started suddenly, sprung out upon the floor, between his bed and mine, making the whole house quiver, placed his hands upon my stomach, and leaped clear over me and my bed at a bound. At first, I thought my “time had come,” for I fancied he was about to “slash” me in two with a knife; but having executed the gymnastic feat just described, he withdrew his hands, and stood in a kind of crouching position, trembling like a leaf—especially like an aspen leaf.
“What’s the matter?” I asked, trembling about as much as he.
“Hush!” he whispered, in an awful manner. “They’re at the window! They were pointing their muskets in! One of them touched me on the head. Look! See their bayonets at the window! Where’s my knife? Reach and get it for me from my pants’ pocket! Do!”