The World's Greatest Books [Volumes 1-15, 17-20]

Still she went, leaving one familiar object after another, till reddening daylight found her many a long mile, upon the open highway, on the way to the village of T---- upon the Ohio river, when she constrained herself to walk regularly and composedly, quickening the speed of her child, by rolling an apple before him, when the boy would run with all his might after it; this ruse often repeated carried them over many a half-mile.

An hour before sunset she came in sight of the river, which lay between her and liberty. Great cakes of floating ice were swinging heavily to and fro in the turbid waters. Eliza turned into a small public house to ask if there was no ferry boat.

"No, indeed," said the hostess, stopping her cooking as Eliza's sweet, plaintive voice fell on her ear; "the boats has stopped running." Eliza's look of dismay struck her and she said, "Maybe you're wanting to get over? anybody sick? Ye seem mighty anxious."

"I've got a child that's very dangerous," said Eliza, "I never heard of it till last night, and I've walked quite a piece to-day, in hopes to get to the ferry."

"Well, now, that's unlucky" said the woman, her motherly sympathies aroused; "I'm rilly concerned for ye. Solomon!" she called from the window. "I say Sol, is that ar man going to tote them bar'ls over to-night?"

"He said he should try, if 'twas any ways prudent," replied a man's voice.

"There's a man going over to-night, if he durs' to; he'll be in to supper, so you'd better sit down and wait. That's a sweet little fellow" added the woman, offering him a cake.

But the child, wholly exhausted, cried with weariness.

"Take him into this room," said the woman opening into a small bedroom, and Eliza laid the weary boy on the comfortable bed, and held his hands till he was fast asleep. For her there was no rest, the thought of her pursuers urged her on, and she gazed with longing eyes on the swaying waters between her and liberty.

She was standing by the window as Haley and two of Mr. Shelby's servants came riding by. Sam, the foremost, catching sight of her, contrived to have his hat blown off, and uttered a loud and characteristic ejaculation. She drew back and the whole train swept by to the front door. A thousand lives were concentrated in that moment to Eliza. Her room opened by a side door to the river. She caught her child and sprang down the steps. The trader caught a glimpse of her as she disappeared down the bank, and calling loudly to Sam and Andy, was after her like a hound after a deer. Her feet scarce seemed to touch the ground, a moment brought her to the water's edge. Right on behind they came, and nerved with strength such as God gives only to the desperate, with one wild and flying leap, she vaulted sheer over the current by the shore, on to the raft of ice beyond. It was a desperate leap--impossible to anything but madmen and despair. The huge green fragment of ice pitched and creaked as her weight came on it, but she stayed there not a moment. With wild cries and desperate energy she leaped to another and still another cake; stumbling, leaping, slipping, springing upwards again. Her shoes were gone--her stockings cut from her feet--while blood marked every step; but she saw nothing, felt nothing, till dimly she saw the Ohio side, and a man helping her up the bank.

"Yer a brave girl, now, whoever ye are!" said he. Eliza recognised a farmer from near her old home. "Oh, Mr. Symmes! save me! do save me! do hide me!" said Eliza.

"Why, what's this?" said the man, "why, if 'taint Shelby's gal!"

"My child!--this boy--he'd sold him! There is his mas'r," said she, pointing to the Kentucky shore. "Oh, Mr. Symmes, you've got a little boy."

"So I have," said the man, as he roughly but kindly helped her up the bank. "Besides, you're a right brave gal. I'd be glad to do something for you. The best thing I can do is to tell you to go there," pointing to a large white house, standing by itself, "they're kind folks. There's no kind o' danger but they'll help you--they're up to all that sort of thing."

"The Lord bless you!" said Eliza earnestly, and folding her child to her bosom, walked firmly away.