led by an imperious
necessity. He mounted the ricketty and creaking stair, with the
bannister half gone and the steps groaning beneath his tread as if they
contained the spirits of the dead respectability that had left them half
a century before. He had been told that the old woman lived on the third
floor, and though he met no one he concluded to dare the perils of a
second ascent, in spite of the landing place being in almost pitchy
darkness. Rushing along with a hasty step that even the gloom could not
make a slower one, he felt something bump against his knees and the
lower part of his body, and then something human fell to the floor with
a crash that had the jingling of broken crockery blended with it.

"Boo! hoo! hoo! e-e-e-gh! Mammy! Mammy!" yelled a voice. "Boo! hoo! hoo!
e-e-e-gh! Mammy! Mammy!" and Crawford could just discern that he had run
over and partially demolished a little negro boy carrying a pitcher, the
pitcher and the boy seeming to have suffered about equally. Neither of
them had any nose left, to speak of; and the little imp did not make any
effort to rise from the floor, but lay there and yelled merrily. The
victor in the collision did not have much time for inspection, for the
moment after a door at the back end of the passage opened hurriedly, and
a hideous old negro woman came rushing out, with a sputtering fragment
of lighted tallow-candle in her hand, and exclaiming:

"What's de matter, Jeffy? Here am Mamma!"

"Big man run'd ober me! broke de pitcher! Boo! hoo! hoo!" yelled the
black atom in reply, without any additional effort at getting up.

"Get out ob dar! d--n you, I run'd ober _you_, mind dat!" screeched out
the old woman, catching sight of the dark form of Crawford. "Hurtin'
leetle boys!--I pay you for it, honey!"

"I hit him accidentally," said the lawyer, who had no intention of
getting into a row in that "negro quarter." "It was dark, and I did not
see him. I'll pay for the pitcher."

"Will you, honey?" said the old woman, mollifying instantly. "Well den,
'spose you couldn't help it. Get up, Jeffy."

"Can you tell me whether Mrs. ---- lives on any of the floors of this
house?" asked Crawford.

"Nebber mind dat, till you gib me de money!" answered the old woman, not
to be diverted by any side-issues. "Dat are pitcher cost a quarter,
honey!"

Crawford was feeling in his pocket for one of the quarters that yet
remained in that receptacle, preparatory to going out of circulat