all held a certain rawness, an
irrepressible juvenility.

As Peter came up, Tump Pack detached himself from the group and gave a
pantomime of thrusting. He was clearly reproducing the action which had
won for him his military medal. Then suddenly he fell down in the dust
and writhed. He was mimicking with a ghastly realism the death-throes of
his four victims. His audience howled with mirth at this dumb show of
the bayonet-fight and of killing four men. Tump himself got up out of
the dust with tears of laughter in his eyes. Peter caught the end of his
sentence, "Sho put it to 'em, black boy. Fo' white men--"

His audience roared again, swayed around, and pounded one another in an
excess of mirth.

Siner shouted from across the street two or three times before he caught
Tump's attention. The ex-soldier looked around, sobered abruptly.

"Whut-chu want, nigger?" His inquiry was not over-cordial.

Peter nodded him across the street.

The heavily built black in khaki hesitated a moment, then started across
the street with the dragging feet of a reluctant negro. Peter looked at
him as he came up.

"What's the matter, Tump?" he asked playfully.

"Ain't nothin' matter wid me, nigger." Peter made a guess at Tump's
surliness.

"Look here, are you puffed up because Cissie Dildine struck you for a
ten?"

Tump's expression changed.

"Is she struck me fuh a ten?"

"Yes; on that school subscription."

"Is dat whut you two niggers wuz a-talkin' 'bout over thaiuh in yo'
house?"

"Exactly." Peter showed the list, with Cissie's name on it. "She told me
to collect from you."

Tump brightened up.

"So dat wuz whut you two niggers wuz a-talkin' 'bout over at yo' house."
He ran a fist down into his khaki, and drew out three or four one-dollar
bills and about a pint of small change. It was the usual crap-shooter's
offering. The two negroes sat down on the ramshackle porch of an old
jeweler's shop, and Tump began a complicated tally of ten dollars.

By the time he had his dimes, quarters, and nickels in separate stacks,
services in the village church were finished, and the congregation came
filing up the street. First came the school-children, running and
chattering and swinging their books by the straps; then the business men
of the hamlet, rather uncomfortable in coats and collars, hurrying back
to their stores; finally came the women, surrounding the preacher.

Tump and Peter walked on up to the entrance of the Plant