fascination, searched all his pockets for his lost money, then searched
them again, hunting for loose change.
The disgusted clerk tossed the bag of peanuts back into the roaster,
laid the orange back on the shelf, walked over to a chair and sat down,
his mind spluttering like wet fireworks with his unspoken comments on
the colored race in general and Hitch in particular.
Hitch stumbled stupidly out of the store, broke and broken-hearted.
He looked around him uncertainly, then dragged his ponderous feet back
toward the depot, hoping to find his lost money. After half an hour’s
search he gave it up and started aimlessly toward the river.
Half-way down the block he met a tall negro whose face was slightly
disfigured by a broken nose. The man wore a checkerboard suit of
clothes, a cowboy hat, and a sport shirt. Hitch’s eyes fell first upon
the emblem of a negro lodge which the man wore on the lapel of his coat.
Hitch eagerly laid hold upon his lodge brother, “I’s in powerful bad
trouble, brudder,” he moaned. “I ain’t know nobody in dis town an’ I
done loss all my money on my way to dis place. Whut kin be did?”
“De next best thing is to go down to de big mill an’ set on de
buzz-saw,” the brother advised.
“Whut good will dat do me?” Hitch inquired.
“It’ll fix you so trouble won’t trouble you no more,” Checkerboard
grinned, patting Hitch on his powerful back. “Atter you takes yo’ seat
you won’t need no money--de Nights of Darkness lodge will bury yo’
remainders free fer nothin’ an’ sot you up a real nice tombstone.”
“I got plenty white folks in my own home town,” Hitch continued, paying
no attention to his companion’s foolishness. “I mought could git some
he’p mebbe ef I had somewhar to wait at ontil dey sont me de money.”
The checkerboard negro looked Hitch over; then his eyes narrowed and he
smiled.
“As a lodge brudder in good standin’, I could lead you to my own house
an’ keep you a little while,” Checkerboard remarked. “Whar is yo’ lodge
pin?”
Hitch glanced down at the lapel of his coat.
“My gosh!” he mourned. “I done loss my money an’ my lodge breastpin
too. Dat breastpin wus jes’ perzackly like de one you is got on an’ wus
gib me by Skeeter Butts.”
“Suttinly,” Checkerboard laughed. “Dey is all made alike an’ look jes’
de same. Mebbe de feller whut touched yo’ wad frisked yo’ pin, too.”
“Dat’s whut happened,” Hitch sighed. “But it don’t he’p me none to know
dat news.”
“You’se too blame young to be trabbelin’ alone,” Checkerboard
snickered. “You needs a fust-rate gardeen. Foller atter me!”
He conducted Hitch to the rear of the big sawmill, led him through a
maze of immense lumber piles, and brought him around the big mill-pond
to a cluster of houses built by the owners of the mill for the
occupancy of their negro employees.
There was one two-story house which looked like a barracks, and was
intended for use by men who had no families. Into this Checkerboard led
his companion.
“Set down, Revun,” he smiled. “Dis here is my boardin’-house. I keeps
it fer de ’commodation of de nigger workers in de mill whut ain’t got
no wifes an’ no home. Dey eats in dat eatin’-house down dar by de
mill-pond an’ sleeps here.”
“It’s powerful hot in dis place,” Hitch complained as he seated himself.
“We keeps de winders down in de daytime because eve’ybody whut stays
here is busy in de mill,” Checkerboard explained, as he pulled off his
coat and hung it across his arm. “Pull off dat coat of yourn, an’ I’ll
take yo’ stove-pipe hat an’ coat an’ hang ’em up wid mine.”
Hitch gratefully removed his hat and coat and sat down. He took a
stogie from his vest-pocket and felt for a match.
“Don’t you wanter take off dat vest, too?” Checkerboard inquired. “You
might git seegar ash all over it.”
“Dat’s right,” Hitch said, as he handed his friend the vest.
“Make yo’se’f at home, Revun,” Checkerboard said graciously. “Smoke all
you please to--spit on de flo’--ack like you wus at yo’ own house! I
got to hump aroun’ a leetle on bizzness befo’ de mill blows de whistle
fer closin’ time. But I tells you in eggsvance, dat as fur’s I’m
concerned, you kin stay in dis house fer a mont’.”
“You is a true lodge brudder,” Hitch rumbled in real gratitude. “I
won’t never fergit you!”
Checkerboard left the room, walked through the hallway, passed out
of the rear door, clambered down into a gulley, and carried Hitch’s
clothes through a labyrinth of lumber piles to a place far, far away!
Hitch waited for nearly an hour for Checkerboard to return. Feeling the
lack of companionship, he walked down to the mill-pond and accosted
the slouchy negro woman in the kitchen of the eating-house.
To his surprise he learned that she had never seen nor heard of the man
in the checkerboard suit.
“It ’pears to me like dese here folks ain’t plum’ honest,” Hitch
mourned as he walked disconsolately around the mill-pond trying to find
his way back to the village.
He spent a long time looking for the man who had his clothes, mumbling
complainingly to himself the while. At last he wandered to the wharf on
the Mississippi River and sat down with his back resting against a post.
His feet were unaccustomed to the wear of patent-leather shoes, and
they felt swollen and tired. He took off his shoes, set them side by
side in front of him, waved his feet in the cool river breeze, and
gazed upon his footwear lovingly.
“I kin git me anodder hat an’ coat,” he muttered. “But dem shoes would
be a powerful loss. Dar ain’t no more shoes in N’Awleens dat’ll fit my
foots!”
Half a block away two little white boys were cutting monkey-shines
on the sidewalk. In the dusty gutter one boy picked up a long, black
stocking.
The two considered this find for a moment, then they gathered small
sticks and thrust them into the stocking. One youth produced a ball of
kite twine and tied an end of the twine around the open end of the
stocking. After that, they dropped the stocking upon the pavement and
pulled it along by the string, observing the effect.
“It wiggles all right,” they chuckled.
They looked around for a victim and spotted Hitch Diamond.
One of the boys held the stocking and concealed himself behind a pile
of lumber on the wharf. The other boy, playing out the ball of twine,
walked along the wharf, his bare feet making no sound. He passed close
behind Hitch Diamond and stopped and concealed himself on the other
side of some shipping about one hundred feet beyond the point where
Hitch Diamond sat.
Then the boy with the ball began to wind the twine in. The long black
stocking crawled up closer and closer to the inert form of Hitch
Diamond.
Finally, when the stocking had wriggled grotesquely to within ten feet
of Hitch Diamond, there was a loud whoop--a white boy ran from behind
some lumber and shrieked:
“Look at that sna-a-a-ke, nigger! Jump!”
Hitch jumped.
He sprinted down the wharf a hundred yards, pattering along in his sock
feet, leaving his precious shoes behind him.
The little white boy shrieked with laughter, picked up the wriggling
stocking, and jumped next for Hitch’s shoes.
For a moment he paused, filled with awe when he beheld their monstrous
and incredible size; then, doubtless reflecting upon their resemblance
to a big mudscow, he put each shoe where a mudscow properly belongs--in
the river!
“Hey, you nigger!” a wharf watchman called sharply, as Hitch, looking
behind him, ran full tilt into the watchman’s portly form.
“’Scuse me, boss!” Hitch grunted.
The watchman hung three strong fingers in the collar of Hitch’s white
shirt. Hitch didn’t like that. He pulled away. The watchman pulled too.
The inevitable happened.
Hitch’s shirt tore half in two and hung limply in the watchman’s
hands as Hitch raced down the wharf clad in socks, pants, and a red
undershirt!
The watchman disgustedly tossed his spoils on top of a lumber pile and
gave himself up to the placid contemplation of the flight of some gulls
on the river.
“Lawd,” Hitch sighed, when he had dodged around the distant end of the
wharf and had time to look down at his deficient apparel. “Dis here
town shore is hard on clothes!”
III
FOURTEEN SWALLOWS.
Keeping the river levee between himself and the town so that no one
could see him in his half-dressed condition, Hitch departed from the
vicinity of Sawtown with expedition. When he reached the edge of the
woods about a mile from the mill, he sat down to think a way out of
his difficulties.
“My head is jes’ like a mule’s head,” he announced to himself. “I
cain’t hold but only one notion at a time. I been thinkin’ so heavy all
de time about my lost money dat I done loss all my good clothes, too.
I oughter knowed better. Now I’s gwine git active an’ sot myse’f up in
bizzness agin.”
He sat for a long time in deep, silent meditation, trying to extract an
idea from his slow brain. Then he concluded:
“I drunk too much dram in N’Awleens. My head ain’t right. Ef I could
git me a good dram now, mebbe I could think up a notion whut to do.”
In his impoverished condition he saw no way of buying a drink. He cast
about to see what he possessed which he might exchange for one, and
pulled out of his hip-pocket his silk socks, the joy and pride of his
life in their glorious coloring--purple, striped with yellow!
“Dey costed me two dollars,” Hitch sighed as he gazed upon them fondly.
“I could swap ’em off in Sawtown, but I ain’t gwine back dar no more.
Ef I does, some nigger will steal my pants an’ my socks, too. Plenty of
country niggers is got dram.”
He walked barefooted through the woods and came out at a level
plantation some distance back from the river. In the middle of a
cow-pasture, a tall, brown, bright-eyed negro watched Hitch approach
with impassive curiosity.
“Howdy, my brudder!” Hitch boomed. “How am yo’ soul an’ spirit dis day?”
“De spirit is pretty low, elder,” the farmer replied. “De ole woman am
got de dram all locked up tight.”
“How come you choose de lily-pad route an’ live on water?” Hitch asked
in a disappointed tone.
“I got married,” the young negro responded with a grin.
Suddenly a big Jersey bull broke through the underbrush and came toward
the two men, snorting, bellowing, pawing the ground, tossing the dirt
upon his shoulders, and shaking his powerful head.
“Dat’s mine, stranger,” the young man remarked proudly, removing the
top from a bucket on his arm and tossing a handful of salt at the
animal’s feet. “He don’t like dat red undershirt of your’n. Ain’t him a
dandy?”
“Shore is,” Hitch said meditatively. After a moment, he added: “Ef dat
ole bull wus to hook one of us, I ’speck yo’ bride would affode us a
little dram to stimulate us up.”
“I resigns in yo’ favor, elder,” the owner grinned. “Ef dis here beast
wus to butt me, he’d jolt all my kinnery plum’ back to Afriky.”
There was a period of silent and fruitless meditation. Then,
sorrowfully, Hitch Diamond reached to his hip-pocket and brought forth
his purple socks with the yellow stripes--all, except his trousers,
that remained of his former glory.
“Whut’s yo’ name?” Hitch asked.
“Dey calls me Dude Blackum because I got a gold tooth,” the other
informed him.
“Whut is yo’ wife called?” Hitch asked next.
“Dainty.”
“I wants to make a little trade, Dude,” Hitch remarked, after he had
told his own name. “Dese here socks costed me two dollars. My head
ain’t thinkin’ right to-day. You is a heavy thinker. Ef you kin think
up a sketch of how I kin git a dram right now, I’ll bestow dese here
socks on you.”
“De trade is did!” Dude grinned, showing his gold tooth. “Lemme think!”
“Bawl out, nigger!” Hitch grumbled after a little wait. “Don’t keep me
waitin’ here in expense no longer.”
“I wus studyin’ ’bout dis,” Dude said. “I’s got a little touch of
lumbago in my legs. An’ mebbe, ef dat bull would jes’ butt me real easy
like, an’ I’d kinder drap off in dat bayou an’ git wet, an’ den walk
back home in drippy clothes wid dis mis’ry gnawin’ at my legs----”
Hitch’s face was so expressive of contempt that Dude stopped speaking.
“Is dat whut you call heavy thinkin’?” Hitch inquired in sarcastic
tones. “Dat high-brow plan might steal you a nubbin of corn from a
blind pig’s slop-trough. But Dainty ain’t no blind pig--dese here
brides gits awful wise on deir husbunts atter dey marries ’em.”
“Wait till I finish, Hitch,” Dude begged. “Now, my view is dis: you
go up to de house an’ cornverse Dainty till I comes in all wet an’
mournin’ ’bout how hurt I is. Atter I come in, you say to Dainty dat
she better gimme a dram because I’s so crippled up. Of co’se, she will
hab to be manners an’ gib you some, too.”
“Dar, now!” Hitch boomed. “You shore is a smart boy, Dude. Dat plan is
accawdin’ to de Bible, wise as suppents an’ harmless as ducks. But”----
Here Hitch broke off and looked down at his clothes.
“It ’pears to me it ain’t proper to call on a lady when I is barefooted
an’ ain’t got nothin’ on but a pair of pants an’ a red undershirt,” he
mourned.
“Dat won’t make no diffunce,” Dude assured him. “All de niggers wucks
in de big mill dresses jes’ like you is now. Dainty will figger dat you
is a sawmill hand. Talk right up to her, Revun”----
“I ain’t no preacher!” Hitch interrupted, growling like an angry bear.
“I’s a prize-fighter.”
“Dat won’t do,” Dude chuckled, as he looked at the giant’s mighty arms
and shoulders. “Dainty is powerful sot on preachers. I ’speck you
better be one as long as you is hangin’ aroun’ her.”
“All right,” Hitch said reluctantly, as he started away. “I ain’t none
too good or too proud to piddle wid dat job--ef I got to.”
“Hol’ on, Hitch!” Dude exclaimed. “You ain’t gimme dem silk socks yit!”
Hitch’s experience in Sawtown had made him cautious. After a man has
parted with a certain amount of his wearing apparel, he becomes
reluctant to separate himself from the rest in a civilized community
unless he contemplates becoming a he-mermaid and living in the river.
Hitch held out one sock.
“I’ll gib you one sock now, Dude,” he said cunningly. “Dat’ll keep yo’
mind int’rusted. Atter I git de dram, I’ll leave de yuther sock on de
flo’ or de mantlepiece, kinder keerless like.”
Dude accepted the partial payment and stuck the gaudy sock into his
derby hat and placed the hat on his head.
On his way to the cabin, which lay across the pasture, Hitch Diamond
also did some heavy thinking.
“I wonder how much dram dat nigger woman is got,” he muttered to
himself. “I bet dar ain’t enough for two. Ef she ain’t nothin’ but one
of dese here soft, giggly, gal-wifes, mebbe I kin bamboozle her outen a
dram befo’ Dude comes in.”
Dainty met Hitch at the door.
“My name am Hitch Diamond, Dainty,” he rumbled. “I met Dude out in
de cow pasture an’ he tole me he done cormitted mattermony. I felt
powerful bad because he didn’t send fer his ole preacher frien’ to come
’n’ marrify him. He sont me up here to take a look at you.”
“Come in, elder,” Dainty giggled. “How is you feelin’ to-day?”
“Lawd, honey, I feels a whole passel better since I sot my eyes on you.
You’s prettier’n a little pig. But I been feelin’ powerful sick.”
“Whut ails you?” the girl asked with instant sympathy.
“I’s got a wo-begone spasm in my stomick an’ a empty feelin’ in my
head.”
“Dat’s too bad,” Dainty said. “Would a little drap----”
“Yes’m,” Hitch responded promptly. “Dat’s jes’ de med’cine I needs. De
dorctor obscribes brandy fer all my ailments.”
Dainty extracted a key from the pocket of her dress and opened the door
of a little storeroom which contained a little trunk. Drawing forth
another key, she opened the trunk and brought out a jug.
“I’s glad Dude didn’t come to de house wid you,” Dainty remarked. “I
don’t let him hab no more booze. He come home ’bout two weeks ago an’
couldn’t git past dat oak tree out dar in dat yard. He seed two trees
whar dar wusn’t but jes’ only one, an’ he mighty nigh butted his fool
head off tryin’ to walk between dem trees.”
She set the jug and the drinking glass beside Hitch Diamond and took
her seat in a rickety hide-bottomed chair.
Hitch looked at the glass, picked it up and fumbled it, and set it down
apologetically.
“Sister Dainty,” he murmured, “ef you ain’t got no objections, I’ll
drink outen dis jug de way I wus raised.”
Catching the handle with his left hand, he gave the jug a quick turn,
rested it upon the crook of his uplifted elbow, and applied his lips to
the spout. Dainty watched him with fascinated eyes.
When at last he set the jug upon the table and seated himself beside
it, she said with a chuckle:
“Elder, when I wus a little gal I wus always countin’--I used to count
de cobs in de feed-trough, an’ de beans in a hull, an’ de number of
swallers a cow tuck when she drunk water.”
“Jes’ so,” Hitch responded, wiping his mouth on the sleeve of his red
undershirt.
“Seben swallers is a big drink fer a cow, elder,” Dainty continued.
“Dat’s right,” Hitch agreed.
“Elder,” Dainty chuckled, “when you wus drinkin’ outen my jug, you
swallered fo’teen times!”
“Yes’m,” Hitch replied solemnly. “I tole you I wus feelin’ powerful
sick!”
Suddenly he remembered that he was playing the part of a preacher. He
decided he ought to say something religious. So he began:
“Sister Dainty, dis am de Bible law about de imbibin’ of awjus liquors:
de amount of booze a man oughter drink depen’s on how much he kin hold
inside hisse’f an’ at de same time resist de effecks; but, neverdeless
an’ howsumever, eve’y man oughter take a little dram fer his stomick’s
ache in case of powerful sickness.”
“Yes, suh,” Dainty agreed.
“Now you notify de case of yo’ husbunt tryin’ to make a goat of hisse’f
an’ butt down all de timber in de yard. I feels like I oughter tell you
dat dat nigger is plum’ full of guile. Right dis minute, he’s figgerin’
to fall in de bayou an’ come to de house all wet, an’ say de bull done
butted him, an’ ax fer a leetle drap.”
“Am--_dat_--so?” Dainty inquired with popping eyes.
“Yes’m,” Hitch assured her. “Of co’se, a man in my perfesh don’t
harmonize wis no sech plans like dat. Hit’s a sin ag’in’ de conscience.”
Dainty stood up and laid her hand upon the handle of the jug.
“I’s gwine put dis jug back in de storeroom. Dude don’t git none. He is
a fraudful nigger!” She set the jug on the top of the trunk, locked the
storeroom, and went to the kitchen.
Hitch heard her chopping kindling wood and rattling the stove-lids. He
heard the roar of the fire as the flame from the rich pine-knots soared
up the chimney.
Ten minutes later Dainty entered and sat down with Hitch again, her
eyes gleaming with wifely resolution.
“Dar he comes now!” Hitch snickered, pointing through the window. “Look
at him--wet as a b’iled owl an’ walkin’ lame in bofe behime legs like a
stringhalt mule. Lawd, Lawd!”
IV
A PIPE OF ’BACKY.
The gate opened and Dude Blackum stumbled in, walking to the door with
every manifestation of suffering his imagination could devise.
Hitch, standing behind Dainty so she could not see, encouraged Dude’s
painful progress by waving the other silk purple-and-yellow sock at him.
“My Lawd, Dainty,” Dude wailed, “whut you reckin dat ole bull went an’
done to me?”
“Butted you in de bayou!” Dainty answered promptly.
“Yes’m, dat’s it! I’s cripple in bofe behime legs fer life!” Dude told
her as he clasped his back with both hands and groaned. “I couldn’t
swim a lick because I couldn’t kick. Ef I hadn’t paddled out wid my
hands I’d ’a’ been drownded.”
He looked appealingly toward Hitch Diamond, waiting for the bogus elder
to suggest the booze. But Hitch merely wiped his hand across his mouth
and grinned.
“Dainty, honey,” Dude said pleadingly, “I’s powerful hurted, an’ I feel
like I’s gwine hab a rigger. Ain’t you got a leetle----”
“I shore has,” Dainty replied eagerly, without waiting for the
question. “Git in de yuther room an’ take off dem wet clothes, an’ by
dat time I’ll hab you a good dram ready.”
With a beatific grin at Hitch Diamond, to which Hitch responded, Dude
retired to change his clothes. A moment later he came out and said to
Hitch:
“Gimme dat yuther silk sock!”
“A trade am a trade,” Hitch grinned as he handed it over. “Ain’t one
sock wet?”
“Naw!” Dude whispered. “I laid it on de groun’ till I jumped in de
bayou, an’ I fotch it home under my hat.”
When Dude reappeared he was clothed in his best suit and wore the
gaudiest socks he had ever owned.
“Set down by dis table, Dude,” Dainty said.
She went to the kitchen, and returned carrying a bowl, the rank odor of
its contents permeating the room.
“My gawsh, Dainty!” Dude howled as she set the bowl of steaming liquid
before him. “Whut is dis mess--a b’iled rat?”
“Naw,” Dainty said in her sweetest tones. “It’s a bowl of hot sass’fras
tea!”
Dude howled his disgust.
“It’s mighty good fer a nigger whut’s had a accidunt, Dude,” Dainty
told him with suspicious gentleness.
Dude glanced at Hitch Diamond. That gentleman’s face was set in a
monstrous, mouth-stretching grin, and his eyes danced with unholy glee.
“Huh!” Dude grunted. He sheepishly bent his head over the bowl of
sassafras tea and sipped its last drop without saying a word.
“Dat fake preacher prize-fighter is done scratched me out,” he
reasoned. “I’ll git even, or die!”
Finishing his tea, Dude rose to his feet. “I’s gwine out to feed de
pigs fer de night, Dainty,” he said. “I’ll be back in a minute.”
Dude sat down in the door of the corncrib and meditated deeply upon a
proper method of retaliation.
“Dat Hitch Diamond thinks he’s purty blame peart in his head,” he
announced to himself. “He thinks dat he’s got so much sense dat his
eyes looks red.”
He ran his hands deep into his pockets and meditated some more. Then he
shook his head hopelessly.
“I ain’t got nothin’ in my head but squash-seed. When I tries to
ponder, it gibs me blind-staggers in my brains. I hope, some day, dat
nigger will hab to swaller a whole sassafras-tree!”
He stood up and started slowly back toward the house. He looked tired
and worn. He had most certainly never heard of Ralph Waldo Emerson,
but he would have agreed with that philosopher in the statement that
“thinking is the hardest work in the world.”
“I reckin I’ll hab to take dese new socks fer my pay an’ call it even,”
he sighed. “Dar ain’t no revengeunce comin’ to me. Dainty an’ Hitch is
too much team to pull ag’in.”
He walked into the room where the two sat, nursing a grouch and by no
means disposed to be courteous to his guest. He took a corn-cob pipe
from his pocket, scratched in the bottom of another pocket for some
crumbs of smoking tobacco, and lighted up.
“Dude is got anodder pipe, elder. Would you wish to smoke?” Dainty
inquired.
“Yes’m,” Hitch responded. “It’ll kinder sottle my stomick fer my supper
vittles.”
Dude arose grumpily, walked to the mantle shelf, and picked up a
pipe. Out of one pocket he brought a few crumbs of smoking tobacco,
then scraped the bottom of another pocket for a few more crumbs. He
emptied some papers and matches and pieces of string out of a mug on
the mantle, and poured out a few more crumbs. Then, behind a picture,
his eyes caught the gleam of metal, and he brought out something which
looked like a flask. He poured a few crumbs out of this into his hand,
finished filling the pipe as he turned his back, and reached for a
match. Passing them to Hitch, Dude took his chair on the far side of
the room near the open door.
Hitch struck the match and sucked the flame into the bowl of his pipe.
_Pow!_
The pipe burst into fragments, the room filled with smoke, Dainty
screamed, and Hitch Diamond performed a number of interesting circus
stunts and tumbled over in a squalling, bellowing heap upon the floor.
“Git de booze, Dainty!” Dude screamed. “Fotch out de jug! De elder is
done cormitted death!”
Dainty sprang to the storeroom door, opened it, and handed Dude the jug.
“Oo-oo-ee!” Hitch whooped. “I’s dyin’ dead!”
“Go in de kitchen an’ fotch a drinkin’ cup!” Dude howled to his wife.
Dainty bounced into the kitchen, slamming the door behind her. Dude
quickly latched the door so that Dainty could not enter the room again
without going entirely around the house.
“Oo-oo-ee!” Hitch Diamond howled. “He’p!”
“Shut up, you ole fool!” Dude commanded as he walked over and bestowed
upon the giant prize-fighter a most earnest and soul-satisfying kick.
“Me an’ dis jug ain’t gwine ’socheate wid you no more. You ain’t fitten
comp’ny!”
“Don’t leave me, Dude!” Hitch begged. “I’s all collapsed down!”
Dude picked up his derby hat, stopped at the door, and looked back:
“Sass’fras tea is mighty good fer a nigger whut’s had a accidunt,
Hitch. Dainty makes it fine! Atter she fixes you a bowl I advises you
to fill anodder pipe wid gunpowder outen dat flask behime dat picture
an’ take anodder smoke. Good-bye!”