At the bank, where Vinegar Atts worked, Gaitskill heard that a woman named Button Hook had shot Tick Hush, and that Skeeter had nursed him all night.
From Dr. Moseley Gaitskill learned that Tick had not been shot or robbed, but had been beaten over the head with some blunt instrument, and his face had been badly cut with some sharp tool.
All of which was interesting enough to induce Gaitskill to make a personal investigation.
He found Tick Hush lying upon a pallet in the rear of the Hen-Scratch saloon, and from him and Skeeter Butts he heard the whole story.
Being familiar with the details of numberless negro courtships, this lengthy narrative lacked the spice of novelty, and Gaitskill was weary long before it was finished.
At last he looked at his watch and rose to his feet.
“Well, Tick,” he smiled, “I think if I were in your predicament I would go out to the pest-house on my farm and run up the yellow flag.”
The two negroes sat in perfect silence for a long time. Finally Tick asked:
“Skeeter, whut did Marse Tom mean by dem words?”
Skeeter smoked four cigarettes in rapid succession. Then the meaning of Gaitskill’s remark shot through him like an electric current.
Given Gaitskill’s two, he multiplied and made forty-four.
He grabbed his hat and ran up the street at full speed.
He stopped first at the home of Ginny Babe Chew, where he held an excited conversation with Dazzle Zenor, the actress. That young woman laughed and applauded, and promptly left the house after Skeeter’s rapid departure.
After that, he ran to the livery stable and held an excited conversation with the negro owner of that establishment.
The liveryman was not at all disposed to do what Skeeter wanted, but Skeeter had learned certain conjuring tricks to attain his ends, and he now performed these tricks with the influential names of Colonel Tom Gaitskill, Sheriff John Flournoy, and Dr. Moseley.
With these big names thundering in his ears, the liveryman consented.
“Keep dis quiet, Lon!” Skeeter warned. “It’s de white folks’ awders. Don’t speak a word!”
Two hours later, a long, black carriage, known to the negroes of Tickfall as the “pest-wagon,” drawn by two solemn mules and driven by Skeeter Butts, stopped at the rear door of the Hen-Scratch saloon.