But Lily shook her head over Berry’s explanation.
“He luk jes’ lak de men dat hunt af’er de run’way niggers!” she insisted, and so Berry again agreed not to tell her father of her discovery of the camping spy.
Orson knew of the Arnolds’ cabin, but kept a good distance from it, although he believed it the cabin of some industrious mountaineer who was, without doubt, loyal to the Confederacy. He had seen Lily and Berry more than once, unseen by them, and supposed Lily to be a negro boy, owned by the Arnolds. He meant, at the right moment, to send “Berry Nees” speeding over the road to Corinth with news for General Beauregard. He kept a nightly watch by the “witch-tree” to see if Berry had brought the sweets that would mean a midnight visit, and, on the second evening after the Arnolds’ visit to the maple grove, his watch was rewarded: for close against the trees rested a number of small packages.
Orson had no scruples in examining these. One contained a glass tumbler filled with honey, over which the spy chuckled, thinking it would be an acceptable addition to his somewhat limited food supply. In another package was a square of maple-sugar, made from the fresh syrup. There was also a small square cake, sweetened with maple-sugar, that Berry had persuaded her mother to make for her that morning. For Berry had noticed that the red-buds were beginning to fade, the leaves rapidly covering such blossoms as remained, and, by cautiously questioning Lily, she discovered that unless the tree were in bloom the witches were not apt to visit them, and she realized she must lose no time in asking their help for news of Mollie.
Berry found no trouble in carrying her gifts to the red-buds near the stream, for that afternoon Lily had gone with Mrs. Arnold to bring home the syrup that Mr. Arnold had made, leaving Berry alone in the cabin. And she collected her supplies and hastened off to leave them at the red-buds, in order that the witches might not fail to find them on their arrival, and she was resolved to be on hand when the witches appeared at midnight, although she was a little fearful that it might not be an easy matter to keep awake until the time came to leave the cabin, or to creep out without being discovered by her mother or father. Nevertheless she was resolved to make the attempt, for it seemed to Berry as if she could get news from Mollie in no other way than through the friendly help of witches, who were new possibilities in Berry’s experience.