“Did you stand there all the time?”
“Dat’s a question to ask, ain’t it? What else would I do? Does I git a chance to see a duel every day?”
“Why, you were right in range! Weren’t you afraid?”
The woman gave a sniff of scorn.
“ ’Fraid! De Smith-Pocahontases ain’t ’fraid o’ nothin’, let alone bullets.”
“They’ve got pluck enough, I suppose; what they lack is judgment. I wouldn’t have stood there.”
“Nobody’s accusin’ you!”
“Did anybody else get hurt?”
“Yes, we all got hit ’cep’ de blon’ twin en de doctor en de seconds. De Jedge didn’t git hurt, but I hear Pudd’nhead say de bullet snip some o’ his ha’r off.”
“ ’George!” said Tom to himself, “to come so near being out of my trouble, and miss it by an inch. Oh dear, dear, he will live to find me out and sell me to some nigger-trader yet—yes, and he would do it in a minute.” Then he said aloud, in a grave tone—
“Mother, we are in an awful fix.”
Roxana caught her breath with a spasm, and said—
“Chile! What you hit a body so sudden for, like dat? What’s be’n en gone en happen’?”
“Well, there’s one thing I didn’t tell you. When I wouldn’t fight, he tore up the will again, and—”
Roxana’s face turned a dead white, and she said—
“Now you’s done!—done forever! Dat’s de end. Bofe un us is gwyne to starve to—”
“Wait and hear me through, can’t you! I reckon that when he resolved to fight, himself, he thought he might get killed and not have a chance to forgive me any more in this life, so he made the will again, and I’ve seen it, and it’s all right. But—”
“Oh, thank goodness, den we’s safe ag’in!—safe! en so what did you want to come here en talk sich dreadful—”
“Hold on, I tell you, and let me finish. The swag I gathered won’t half square me up, and the first thing we know, my creditors—well, you know what’ll happen.”
Roxana dropped her chin, and told her son to leave her alone—she must think this matter out. Presently she said impressively:
“You got to go mighty keerful now, I tell you! En here’s what you got to do. He didn’t git killed, en if you gives him de least reason, he’ll bust de will ag’in, en dat’s de las’ time, now you hear me! So—you’s got to show him what you kin do in de nex’ few days. You’s got to be pison good, en let him see it; you got to do everything dat’ll make him b’lieve in you, en you got to sweeten aroun’ ole Aunt Pratt, too—she’s pow’ful strong wid de Jedge, en de bes’ frien’ you got. Nex’, you’ll go ’long away to Sent Louis, en dat’ll keep him in yo’ favor. Den you go en make a bargain wid dem people. You tell ’em he ain’t gwyne to live long—en dat’s de fac’, too—en tell ’em you’ll pay ’em intrust, en big intrust, too—ten per—what you call it?”
“Ten percent a month?”
“Dat’s it. Den you take and sell yo’ truck aroun’, a little at a time, en pay de intrust. How long will it las’?”
“I think there’s enough to pay the interest five or six months.”
“Den you’s all right. If he don’t die in six months, dat don’t make no diff’rence—Providence’ll provide. You’s gwyne to be safe—if you behaves.” She bent an austere eye on him and added, “En you is gwyne to behave—does you know dat?”
He laughed and said he was going to try, anyway. She did not unbend. She said gravely:
“Tryin’ ain’t de thing. You’s gwyne to do it. You ain’t gwyne to steal a pin—’ca’se it ain’t safe no mo’; en you ain’t gwyne into no bad comp’ny—not even once, you understand; en you ain’t gwyne to drink a drop—nary single drop; en you ain’t gwyne to gamble one single gamble—not one! Dis ain’t what you’s gwyne to try to do, it’s what you’s gwyne to do. En I’ll tell you how I knows it. Dis is how. I’s gwyne to foller along to Sent Louis my own self; en you’s gwyne to come to me every day o’ yo’ life, en I’ll look you over; en if you fails in one single one o’ dem things—jist one—I take my oath I’ll come straight down to dis town en tell de Jedge you’s a nigger en a slave—en prove it!” She paused to let her words sink home. Then she added, “Chambers, does you b’lieve me when I says dat?”
Tom was sober enough now.
