Coco suddenly snatched open the drawer of her bureau, and Skeeter saw the malignant gleam of a nickel-plated, pearl-handled revolver.
“Murder-r-r!” he shrieked as he shot through the door with the speed of a comet.
As he passed out of the door a bullet flattened against the jamb close to his face.
As he passed through the yard gate the splinters from two more bullets were shattered from the posts close beside him.
As he galloped wildly down the street two more bullets kicked up the dust around his flying feet.
He bounced through the swinging doors of the Hen-Scratch saloon and found his establishment crowded with negroes demanding back the money they had bet.
“All bets is declared off, niggers!” Skeeter panted.
He sank weakly into a chair, wiped the sweat from his face with a trembling hand, fanned himself with his hat for a moment, then made another announcement:
“All my weddin’ arrangements is declared off, too, niggers!”
“How come?” the Rev. Vinegar Atts demanded, saddened by the loss of a wedding fee.
Skeeter panted for breath, and finally explained:
Tick Hush looked like a negro who would work like a horse, and who would do as he was told.
Colonel Tom Gaitskill leaned back in his swivel chair for a comprehensive survey of this new applicant for a job.
He saw a brown-skinned man, with a big round head, a flat nose, heavy lips that were easy-smiling, and eyes which were as wide-open, as simple and innocent as the black, glass eyes of a china doll. He noticed that the man stood perfectly straight, without nervousness, and that his big hands were hard and square--the hands of a willing worker.
“I don’t know nothin’ but how to wuck de lan’, Marse Tom,” Tick told him. “Farmin’ is my trade. So when I heerd tell dat you done bought dat farm whar de ole pest-house was located at, I figgered dat dis wus a chance to git me a good job wid a good boss.”
The speech won Gaitskill’s favor. Negroes are afraid of hospitals, quarantine stations, and graveyards. He had had difficulty in securing a negro tenant for this newly acquired farm because the pest-house occupied a portion of the plantation.
“Aren’t you afraid of that farm, Tick?” Gaitskill smiled.
“Naw, suh,” Tick chuckled. “De cullud folks orate ’bout all dem bad ketchin’ diseases in de pest-house, but I ain’t gwine pester aroun’ in dat neighborhood none.”