whole sister! go on! were you twins?" The querist
gave a wild start of surprise at herself and sank to the floor.

"Missie," sighed the old woman, "y'ain't neveh in yo' life stopped to
think dat niggehs is got feelin's, is you?"

The speech was hardly begun before the girl was up and about the
protester's neck: "Hush! ple-ease hush! You've said it before, you've
said it before, you've said it before, before!"

The nurse's eyes filled: "Yass, an' what use it been? De wuss thing I
know 'bout good white folks--an' when I says 'good' I means de
best!--dat is, dat dey don't _believe_ niggehs is got feelin's!" It was
hard to speak on, for Ramsey had pushed her into a chair and was in her
lap.

"They do! they do, mammy Joy, they do!" She fell to kissing her, first
slowly, then wildly as Joy insisted:

"No, dey don't. Ef dey did, Phyllis 'ud neveh 'a' come to de pass she
came to. But dey don't! Some o' de bes' _believes_ dey believes, dat's
all. Oh, I 'llow you, lots o' white folks is got--oh, Lawd! _don't_
spile my breas'-han'kercheh!--is got mo' feelin's dan some niggehs; but
lots o' niggehs is got _lots_ mo' feelin's dan some white folks. Mo' an'
betteh! Now, my sisteh, my yalleh sisteh----"

"Oh, never mind, there's the rising gong! I know your yellow sister must
have had feelings. Tell about Phyllis--and the Courteneys--and the
_Quakeress_."

"Well, I will! Yo' plumb sot on gitt'n' de thing, an'----"

"Yes, and it's not a fit story for me to ask _him_ about and you know
I'll ask him if I have to! And besides, I just know mom-a's told you to
keep me off the hurricane roof any way you can and as long as you
can--listen! the big bell! we're meeting a boat, maybe half a dozen! And
we're passing to labboard. Come! Come on!"

At their own door they espied the passing craft: a single boat, not six;
a tiny, cabinless, one-funnelled, unclean, crawling thing, dimly made
out in the early dusk of the forested shore which it servilely hugged as
if doing all it could to hide its grimy name and identity.

"The _Fly-up-the-Creek_!" gasped Ramsey. "Oh, that _can't_ be all!" She
sprang up a stair, dragging the old woman after, and on the
hurricane-deck, near a paddle-box, stood for a moment in the wide glory
of water, land, and early sky, agape again at the squalid object. Then,
as the full humor of the thing struck her--but her behavior may as well
go undescribed. Yet it could not have been so very bad, for the pilot
high abov