d her dinner, sat on the floor eying Nan as an
intelligent dog eyes its master, ready to respond to look, word or
gesture. Finally, the African, seeing Nan's perplexity, made a
suggestion.

"Make dem cuss-words come," she said. Tasma Tid had heard men use
profane language when fretted or irritated, and she supposed that it was
a remedy for troubles both small and large.

"Be jigged if I haven't a mind to," cried Nan, laughing at the African's
earnestness.

But at last she flung her pen down, seized her hat, and, with an
unspoken invitation to Tasma Tid, went out into the street, determined
to go to the Gaither Place, where Eugenia lived, and present her excuses
in person.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

_Mr. Sanders in His Cups_

When Nan came in sight of the court-house she saw a crowd of men and
boys gazing at some spectacle on the side opposite her. Some were
laughing, while others had serious faces. Among them she noticed Francis
Bethune, and she also saw Gabriel, who was standing apart from the rest
with a very gloomy countenance. Arriving near the crowd, she paused to
discover what had excited their curiosity; and there before her eyes,
seated on the court-house steps, was Mr. Billy Sanders, relating to an
imaginary audience some choice incidents in his family history. His hat
was off, and his face was very red.

As Nan listened, he was telling how his "pa" and "ma" had married in
South Carolina, and had subsequently moved to Jasper County in Georgia.
In coming away (according to Mr. Sanders's version), they had fetched a
half dozen hogs too many, and maybe a cow or two that didn't belong to
them. By-and-by the owners of the stock appeared in the neighbourhood
where Mr. Sanders, Sr., had settled, found the missing property, and
carried him away with them. They had, or claimed to have, a warrant, and
they hustled the pioneer off to South Carolina, and put him in jail.

"Now, Sally Hart was Nancy's own gal," said Mr. Sanders, pausing to take
a nip from a bottle he carried in his pocket. "She was a chip off'n the
old block ef they ever was a block that had a chip. So Sally (that was
ma) she went polin' off to Sou' Ca'liny. The night she got to whar she
was agwine, she tore a hole in the side of the jail that you could 'a'
driv a buggy through. Then she took poor pa by one ear, an' fetched him
home. An' that ain't all. Arter she got him home, she took a rawhide an'
liter'ly wore pa out. She said arterwards that she