hut I is, an' he ain't
muddy black lak whut you is, neither he ain't high yaller lak some is.
To me he looks most of all lak de ground side of a nickel wahtermelon.
An' in all de goin' on sixty-two yeahs of my life I ain't never seen no
pusson callin' theyselves Affikins dat had dat kind of a sickly
greenish-yaller-whitish complexion but whut trouble come pourin' frum
'em sooner or later, an' most gin'rally sooner, lak manna pourin' from
de gourd of de Prophet Jonah. Dat man is a ravelin' wolf, ef ever I seen
one."

"Whut kind of a wolf did you say, Aunt Dilsey?" asked Jeff.

"Consult de Scriptures an' you won't be so ignunt," she answered
crushingly. "Consult de Scriptures an' you'll read whar de ravelin' wolf
come down on de fold, an' whut he done to de fold after he'd done come
down on it wuz more'n aplenty. An' now, boy, you git on out of my
kitchen an' go on 'bout yore business--ef you's got any business, w'ich
I doubts. I ain't got no mo' time to waste on you den whut I is on dat
flighty-haided Eldora Menifee, a-traipsin' round frum one back do' to
'nother with her talk 'bout ladies' auxiliaries an' gittin' yo rights
fur a dollah down an' twenty cents a week."

Jeff faded away. It was comforting in a way to find Aunt Dilsey on his
side, even though her manner rather indicated she resented the fact that
he was on hers. A few evenings later he found out something else. He was
made to know that in another and entirely unsuspected quarter the
endeavors of the diligently crusading and organizing Duvall person had
roused more than a passing curiosity.

One evening, supper being over, Judge Priest lingered on in his
low-ceiled dining room smoking his corncob pipe while Jeff cleared away
the supper dishes. It was the same high-voiced deliberately
ungrammatical Judge Priest that the kindly reader may recall--somewhat
older than at last accounts, somewhat slower in his step--but then he
never had been given to fast movements--and perhaps just a trifle
balder.

"Wuz dey anythin' else you wanted, jedge, 'fore I locks up the back of
the house an' lights out?" Jeff inquired when the table had been reset
for breakfast.

"Yes, I think mebbe there wuz," drawled the old man. He hesitated a
moment almost as though at a loss for a proper phrasing of the thing he
meant to say next. Then: "Jeff, what's come over your race in this town
here lately?"

"Meanin' w'ich, suh?" countered Jeff. "Me, I ain't notice nothin' out of
the