f they thought it was a nigger stealing Uncle
Silas's corn--you notice it makes them look silly, now, to find out
somebody overheard them say that. That's because they found out by and
by who it was that was doing the lugging, and THEY know best why they
swore here that they took it for Uncle Silas by the gait--which it
WASN'T, and they knowed it when they swore to that lie.

"A man out in the moonlight DID see a murdered person put under ground
in the tobacker field--but it wasn't Uncle Silas that done the burying.
He was in his bed at that very time.

"Now, then, before I go on, I want to ask you if you've ever noticed
this: that people, when they're thinking deep, or when they're worried,
are most always doing something with their hands, and they don't know
it, and don't notice what it is their hands are doing, some stroke their
chins; some stroke their noses; some stroke up UNDER their chin with
their hand; some twirl a chain, some fumble a button, then there's some
that draws a figure or a letter with their finger on their cheek,
or under their chin or on their under lip. That's MY way. When I'm
restless, or worried, or thinking hard, I draw capital V's on my cheek
or on my under lip or under my chin, and never anything BUT capital
V's--and half the time I don't notice it and don't know I'm doing it."

That was odd. That is just what I do; only I make an O. And I could see
people nodding to one another, same as they do when they mean "THAT's
so."

"Now, then, I'll go on. That same Saturday--no, it was the night
before--there was a steamboat laying at Flagler's Landing, forty miles
above here, and it was raining and storming like the nation. And there
was a thief aboard, and he had them two big di'monds that's advertised
out here on this courthouse door; and he slipped ashore with his
hand-bag and struck out into the dark and the storm, and he was a-hoping
he could get to this town all right and be safe. But he had two pals
aboard the boat, hiding, and he knowed they was going to kill him the
first chance they got and take the di'monds; because all three stole
them, and then this fellow he got hold of them and skipped.

"Well, he hadn't been gone more'n ten minutes before his pals found it
out, and they jumped ashore and lit out after him. Prob'ly they burnt
matches and found his tracks. Anyway, they dogged along after him all
day Saturday and kept out of his sight; and towards sundown he come to
the bunch of s