“Howdy, Skeeter?” he exclaimed. “Fotch you out anodder chair from de chu’ch. I needs all I’m got.”
Skeeter looked him over and grinned. For a moment he forgot his fears in contemplation of this squat-legged, pot-bellied, moon-faced negro preacher, whose head was bald except for two tufts of hair, one over each ear, which made him resemble a mule wearing a blind bridle.
“You shore is spreadin’ yo’se’f out, Elder,” Skeeter said, as he set his chair close beside Vinegar. “You look like a buzzard whut is tryin’ to fly back’ards an’ upside down at de same time.”
“I’s like a watermillyum vine,” Vinegar boomed. “When I gits sot good, I begins to spraddle.”
Skeeter reached to his hip pocket and brought out his dream book.
“Whut you flashin’ dat book aroun’ fer, Skeeter?” Atts asked suspiciously. “De Bible say dat many study is weary on de flesh.”
“I needs some advices from a scholard,” Skeeter remarked as he lighted a cigarette. “I done smoked up a whole pack of dese here things in de las’ half-hour. I’s powerful worrited in my mind.”
“You done come to de right place fer advices, son,” Atts announced with confidence. “Ef you got anything to ax me, jes’ bawl out!”
“Does you b’lieves in dreams, Elder?” Skeeter began.
“Well, suh, dat depen’s,” Rev. Vinegar Atts announced after a moment of cogitation. “As a preacher, of co’se, I b’lieves in Proverdunce; but ef you ’terrogates me jes’ as a common cullud nigger pusson--of co’se dat’s plum’ diffunt.”
“Is you had any dreams recent?” Skeeter inquired.
“Yes, suh; I dreamt about a wash-tub las’ night,” Vinegar informed him.
“Dis book tells whut dat dream signify,” Skeeter explained, as he opened the volume and turned to the proper page. “I reads dis about tubs: ‘Ef it be filled wid water, you hab evil to fear; an empty tub signify trouble; an’ to run against one, sorrow.’”
With a convulsive movement of his body, he kicked the chair from under his feet, hurled the chairs from under his arms, and upset himself falling over on his back with his feet in the air like an overturned bug.
He jumped up, breathing like a foundered horse.
“Fear, trouble, an’ sorrer!” he bellowed. “I knowed it! I knowed it wus comin’ on all de time!”
He sat down, folded his hands, and gazed around him, his mouth hanging open like the jaws of a bull alligator.