I
Within a low clapboarded hut, with an open front, a forge was glowing.
In front a blacksmith was shoeing a horse, a sleek, well-kept animal
with the signs of good blood and breeding. A young mulatto stood by and
handed the blacksmith such tools as he needed from time to time. A group
of negroes were sitting around, some in the shadow of the shop, one in
the full glare of the sunlight. A gentleman was seated in a buggy a few
yards away, in the shade of a spreading elm. The horse had loosened a
shoe, and Colonel Thornton, who was a lover of fine horseflesh, and
careful of it, had stopped at Ben Davis's blacksmith shop, as soon as he
discovered the loose shoe, to have it fastened on.
"All right, Kunnel," the blacksmith called out. "Tom," he said,
addressing the young man, "he'p me hitch up."
Colonel Thornton alighted from the buggy, looked at the shoe, signified
his approval of the job, and stood looking on while the blacksmith and
his assistant harnessed the horse to the buggy.
"Dat 's a mighty fine whip yer got dere, Kunnel," said Ben, while the
young man was tightening the straps of the harness on the opposite side
of the horse. "I wush I had one like it. Where kin yer git dem whips?"
"My brother brought me this from New York," said the Colonel. "You can't
buy them down here."
The whip in question was a handsome one. The handle was wrapped with
interlacing threads of variegated colors, forming an elaborate pattern,
the lash being dark green. An octagonal ornament of glass was set in the
end of the handle.
"It cert'n'y is fine," said Ben; "I wish I had one like it." He looked
at the whip longingly as Colonel Thornton drove away.
"'Pears ter me Ben gittin' mighty blooded," said one of the bystanders,
"drivin' a hoss an' buggy, an' wantin' a whip like Colonel Thornton's."
"What 's de reason I can't hab a hoss an' buggy an' a whip like Kunnel
Tho'nton's, ef I pay fer 'em?" asked Ben. "We colored folks never had no
chance ter git nothin' befo' de wah, but ef eve'y nigger in dis town had
a tuck keer er his money sence de wah, like I has, an' bought as much
lan' as I has, de niggers might 'a' got half de lan' by dis time," he
went on, giving a finishing blow to a horseshoe, and throwing it on the
ground to cool.
Carried away by his own eloquence, he did not notice the approach of two
white men who came up the street from behind him.
"An' ef you niggers," he continued, raking the coals together over a
fresh bar of iron, "would stop wastin' yo' money on 'scursions to put
money in w'ite folks' pockets, an' stop buildin' fine chu'ches, an'
buil' houses fer yo'se'ves, you 'd git along much faster."
"You 're talkin' sense, Ben," said one of the white men. "Yo'r people
will never be respected till they 've got property."
The conversation took another turn. The white men transacted their
business and went away. The whistle of a neighboring steam sawmill blew
a raucous blast for the hour of noon, and the loafers shuffled away in
different directions.
"You kin go ter dinner, Tom," said the blacksmith. "An' stop at de gate
w'en yer go by my house, and tell Nancy I 'll be dere in 'bout twenty
minutes. I got ter finish dis yer plough p'int fus'."
The young man walked away. One would have supposed, from the rapidity
with which he walked, that he was very hungry. A quarter of an hour
later the blacksmith dropped his hammer, pulled off his leather apron,
shut the front door of the shop, and went home to dinner. He came into
the house out of the fervent heat, and, throwing off his straw hat,
wiped his brow vigorously with a red cotton handkerchief.
"Dem collards smells good," he said, sniffing the odor that came in
through the kitchen door, as his good-looking yellow wife opened it to
enter the room where he was. "I 've got a monst'us good appetite
ter-day. I feels good, too. I paid Majah Ransom de intrus' on de
mortgage dis mawnin' an' a hund'ed dollahs besides, an' I spec's ter hab
de balance ready by de fust of nex' Jiniwary; an' den we won't owe
nobody a cent. I tell yer dere ain' nothin' like propputy ter make a
pusson feel like a man. But w'at 's de matter wid yer, Nancy? Is sump'n'
skeered yer?"
The woman did seem excited and ill at ease. There was a heaving of the
full bust, a quickened breathing, that betokened suppressed excitement.
"I-I-jes' seen a rattlesnake out in de gyahden," she stammered.
The blacksmith ran to the door. "Which way? Whar wuz he?" he cried.
He heard a rustling in the bushes at one side of the garden, and the
sound of a breaking twig, and, seizing a hoe which stood by the door, he
sprang toward the point from which the sound came.
"No, no," said the woman hurriedly, "it wuz over here," and she directed
her husband's attention to the other side of the garden.
The blacksmith, with the uplifted hoe, its sharp blade gleaming in the
sunlight, peered cautiously among the collards and tomato plants,
listening all the while for the ominous rattle, but found nothing.
"I reckon he 's got away," he said, as he set the hoe up again by the
door. "Whar 's de chillen?" he asked with some anxiety. "Is dey playin'
in de woods?"
"No," answered his wife, "dey 've gone ter de spring."
The spring was on the opposite side of the garden from that on which the
snake was said to have been seen, so the blacksmith sat down and fanned
himself with a palm-leaf fan until the dinner was served.
"Yer ain't quite on time ter-day, Nancy," he said, glancing up at the
clock on the mantel, after the edge of his appetite had been taken off.
"Got ter make time ef yer wanter make money. Did n't Tom tell yer I 'd
be heah in twenty minutes?"
"No," she said; "I seen him goin' pas'; he did n' say nothin'."
"I dunno w'at 's de matter wid dat boy," mused the blacksmith over his
apple dumpling. "He 's gittin' mighty keerless heah lately; mus' hab
sump'n' on 'is min',--some gal, I reckon."
The children had come in while he was speaking,--a slender, shapely
boy, yellow like his mother, a girl several years younger, dark like her
father: both bright-looking children and neatly dressed.
"I seen cousin Tom down by de spring," said the little girl, as she
lifted off the pail of water that had been balanced on her head. "He
come out er de woods jest ez we wuz fillin' our buckets."
"Yas," insisted the blacksmith, "he 's got some gal on his min'."