tering from the
landscape.

"Old Aunt Ailsey's conjured all the tails off Sambo's sheep," she remarked,
with feminine wile. "I saw 'em hanging on her door."

"Oh, shucks! she can't conjure!" scoffed the boy. "She's nothing but a free
nigger, anyway--and besides, she's plum crazy--"

"I saw 'em hanging on her door," steadfastly repeated the little girl. "The
wind blew 'em right out, an' there they were."

"Well, they wan't Sambo's sheep tails," retorted the boy, conclusively,
"'cause Sambo's sheep ain't got any tails."

Brought to bay, the little girl looked doubtfully up and down the turnpike.
"Maybe she conjured 'em _on_ first," she suggested at last.

"Oh, you're a regular baby, Betty," exclaimed the boy, in disgust. "You'll
be saying next that she can make rattlesnake's teeth sprout out of the
ground."

"She's got a mighty funny garden patch," admitted Betty, still credulous.
Then she jumped up and ran along the road. "Here's Virginia!" she called
sharply, "an' I beat her! I beat her fair!"

A second little girl came panting through the dust, followed by a small
negro boy with a shining black face. "There's a wagon comin' roun' the
curve," she cried excitedly, "an' it's filled with old Mr. Willis's
servants. He's dead, and they're sold--Dolly's sold, too."

She was a fragile little creature, coloured like a flower, and her smooth
brown hair hung in silken braids to her sash. The strings of her white
pique bonnet lined with pink were daintily tied under her oval chin; there
was no dust on her bare legs or short white socks.

As she spoke there came the sound of voices singing, and a moment later the
wagon jogged heavily round a tuft of stunted cedars which jutted into the
long curve of the highway. The wheels crunched a loose stone in the road,
and the driver drawled a patient "gee-up" to the horses, as he flicked at
a horse-fly with the end of his long rawhide whip. There was about him an
almost cosmic good nature; he regarded the landscape, the horses and the
rocks in the road with imperturbable ease.

Behind him, in the body of the wagon, the negro women stood chanting the
slave's farewell; and as they neared the children, he looked back and spoke
persuasively. "I'd set down if I was you all," he said. "You'd feel better.
Thar, now, set down and jolt softly."

But without turning the women kept up their tremulous chant, bending their
turbaned heads to the imaginary faces upon the roadside. They had lef