he best and two of the weakest. During the Spring long negotiations
were entered into by Miss Smith to "buy" the five men. Colonel Cresswell
and Mr. Tolliver had them all charged with large sums of indebtedness
and these sums had to be assumed by the school. As Colonel Cresswell
counted over two thousand dollars of school notes and deposited them
beside the mortgage he smiled grimly for he saw the end. Yet, even then
his hand trembled and that curious doubt came creeping back. He put it
aside angrily and glanced up.

"Nigger wants to talk with you," announced his clerk.

The Colonel sauntered out and found Bles Alwyn waiting.

"Colonel Cresswell," he said, "I have charge of the buying for the
school and our tenants this year and I naturally want to do the best
possible. I thought I'd come over and see about getting my supplies at
your store."

"That's all right; you can get anything you want," said Colonel
Cresswell cheerily, for this to his mind was evidence of sense on the
part of the Negroes. Bles showed his list of needed supplies--seeds,
meat, corn-meal, coffee, sugar, etc. The Colonel glanced over it
carelessly, then moved away.

"All right. Come and get what you want--any time," he called back.

"But about the prices," said Alwyn, following him.

"Oh, they'll be all right."

"Of course. But what I want is an estimate of your lowest cash prices."

"Cash?"

"Yes, sir."

Cresswell thought a while; such a business-like proposition from Negroes
surprised him.

"Well, I'll let you know," he said.

It was nearly a week later before Alwyn approached him again.

"Now, see here," said Colonel Cresswell, "there's practically no
difference between cash and time prices. We buy our stock on time and
you can just as well take advantage of this as not. I have figured out
about what these things will cost. The best thing for you to do is to
make a deposit here and get things when you want them. If you make a
good deposit I'll throw off ten per cent, which is all of my profit."

"Thank you," said Alwyn, but he looked over the account and found the
whole bill at least twice as large as he expected. Without further
parley, he made some excuse and started to town while Mr. Cresswell went
to the telephone.

In town Alwyn went to all the chief merchants one after another and
received to his great surprise practically the same estimate. He could
not understand it. He had estimated the current market prices according