Strawberry Girl (9 page)

"I purely can't let him walk right over me!" said Pa. He put his arm around Ma's shoulders. "One day, all this trouble will come to an end," he assured her.

"Jest when we thought we was gittin' ahead . ." said Ma.

"We are gittin' ahead," said Pa. "We done well with our oranges, and if we fertilize 'em good, we'll do better next year. We made more on our strawberries than any person I met in town. Tomorrow we'll plow up the field and get it ready to reset it with new plants. Next year we'll make twice as much."

"How can we plow without Seminal" wailed Birdie.

"We still got a horse," said Pa. "Good thing I took Osceola to town today. It might could a been the horse got poisoned. I'll git us a new mule next time I go to town--trade in a cow or two. There's always a way to git ahead when you've got a mind to!"

They all went out to the pasture and looked at the white mule lying stretched out on the ground. Buzz and Pa dug a big hole to bury her.

"Pore ole Seminal" said Birdie.

"Her name's Speckle," said Birdie. "She comes when I call." A speckled hen walked across the porch, followed by ten baby chicks. "Here, you come here, Speckle!"

The hen was quite tame. It jumped on Birdie's knee, then climbed to her shoulder. She held some grains of corn in her hand and the hen gobbled them up. Then it began to peck her ear. "Hey! Dent do that! Dent hurt me!"

Essie and Zephy were friendly again. They had come to play with Dovey and Bunny.

"Once Speckle got a cold," said Birdie. "So I rubbed her throat every day. I poured medicine down till she got well."

"Speckle sleeps in Birdie's room," said Dovey.

"I leave the door open," said Birdie, "so she can come in and go out when she wants to. I made her a nest on a pile of rags under my bed, and she laid an egg there every day."

"And hatched 'em into biddies!" asked Zephy.

"Yes, she sot on 'em for three weeks," said Birdie. "Now I got ten biddies. I'll gentle 'em too, just like Speckle."

Mrs. Boyer was starting a fire under the washpot in the yard.

"Birdie," she called, "go help Buzz with that painting or he'll never git done. You can work from the stepladder and do the low part." "

Let's git our play-dollies," said Dovey. The children walked round the house, and the hen and chicks wandered off.

The time had come to paint the house, though Pa had bought the paint months before. Birdie climbed up on the ladder and set to work. She slapped her paintbrush up and down noisily. It was good to see one plank after another change from its weathered gray to a pearly white. No one would recognize the old Roddenberry house when they got through. Soon it would be called the Boyers' white house. How pretty the box-flowers would look on the porch all white and shiny!

"Gettin' biggety, ain't ye!"

It was Shoestring Slater who spoke. He stood at the foot of the ladder and gave it a shake.

"Go 'long!" cried Birdie. "Git away 'fore I drop a bucket of paint down your neck!"

"Think you're better'n other people, don't ye!" the boy went on.

But just then Buzz came round the house with the high ladder, so Shoestring disappeared. In the middle of the morning, Buzz was called away to help his father. Birdie kept on painting. Her arms ached from lifting the heavy brush. Her legs ached from climbing up and down the ladder. Her face, arms, legs and dress were spattered with white paint. The side of the house seemed endlessly large and the sun was hot.

No one was around. The children had gone into the palmetto tunnel, where it was cool, to play.

Suddenly Birdie smelled smoke. At first she thought it was the fire under the washpot. Then, from the top of the ladder, she noticed the pine smell and saw a cloud of smoke rising in the flatwoods pasture. Was it a forest or a grass fire! Perhaps turpentine and lumbermen had set it to drive out snakes, so the Negro workers would not be afraid to slash the pine trees and set buckets for turpentine. Perhaps cattlemen had set it, to burn off the dead grass so the cattle could get at the new growth.

Birdie shaded her eyes with her hand and studied about it. She saw that the fire was between the Slaters' and the Boyers places. The turpentine men worked farther to the north. Cattlemen-well, if it were set by cattlemen, it could be nobody but Sam Slater. He was the only real cattleman around. All the other neighbors were farmers. They had farms and a bunch of cattle too, but not a big herd like Slater's.

Birdie's face grew serious as she watched. Why should she think somebody had set the fire on purpose? Why was she always so suspicious! Fires often started by accident. Maybe somebody built a bonfire and forgot to put it out.

Anyhow it did not concern her. She turned her back and began to paint the house. She worked fast, thinking how pretty the house would look when it was done.

Then she smelled the smoke again. She dropped the paintbrush in the bucket, as she saw a billowy cloud of smoke sweeping through the piney woods and all through the pasture. It was a grass fire, but the pine trees were burning too. It was moving forward rapidly. She could hear it popping and crackling.

"Ma! Pa! Dixie, Buzz, Dan!" she called. She jumped off the ladder and raced round the house, shouting: "The piney woods is afire!"

Pa and Buzz were nowhere to be seen. Ma and Dixie were washing clothes in the backyard. Dixie stood over the wash- pot, stirring the boiling clothes with a long stick. Ma leaned over the block--a big stump about three feet high--where she had laid some of the dirtiest of the men's clothes, wetted and soaped. She pounded them vigorously with the battling stick. Several tubs and a trough, made from a hollowed-out log, stood near by, filled with water.

Ma and Dixie did not need to be called twice. When they saw the cloud of smoke approaching the house, they seized buckets, dipped them in the tubs of water, and sped out to the pasture, running.

"Get sacks from the crib!" called Ma. "And wet 'em! You, Dan, pump more water and keep the tubs filled!"

"Where's Pa! Where's Buzz! Where they gone to!" wailed Birdie.

Nobody knew. They all ran out to fight the fire. It was close now and coming steadily closer. The grass was burning, setting fire to clumps of palmettos. A loud swoosh and noisy crackle burst out as each new clump of palmetto flared up in flames.

They poured water on the fire, but it did little or no good. The dampened sacks were better. They beat the burning grass with them and thought they were making headway, until they looked and saw that the line of fire was only moving off in other directions. It was about to encircle the house.

"The house!" cried Birdie. "The house will burn!"

All their work to make a new home would be lost if it went up in smoke. Birdie felt sick inside. Would it never get its coat of shiny white paint!

"Birdie!" gasped Ma. "We got to git help. Do it come closer to the house, we cant save it. Get on the horse and ride to the Slaters' and ask 'em all to come quick!"

Birdie flew. She threw herself on Osceola's back and began pounding him on the rump. The horse, sensing danger, picked up his heels. But he would not ride through the smoke. He kept turning and backing. Birdie chose a round- about course, skirting the flames, and rode as fast as she could to the Slater house.

She saw Sam and Gus and Joe sitting on the front porch. She began to yell, "Fire! Fire! Come and put out the fire!"

They could not help but hear her.

They could not help but see and smell the smoke. They must have done so before she came riding up.

But they did not move. They sat on their slat-backed chairs, tipped against the wall of the house, as if they had not a care in the world.

Birdie pulled up her horse at their front steps. "The piney woods is all afire!" she cried. "We need your help mighty bad! Do hit get any worser our house will burn up!" In imagination she could see the Roddenberry house a heap of black and charred ashes.

"A grass fire's a mighty good thing in the spring," said Sam Slater slowly. "Hit's good for greenin' up the woods for the cattle!"

"But our house is burnin' up!" cried Birdie in distress.

The men did not move. They looked at each other and smiled. Then Joe Slater said in a drawling voice, "We’ll be over later!

"

Birdie knew they would never come.

"Where's Shoestring!" she asked. She had a vague hope that he might help her, if she begged him hard enough.

"Dunno," said Joe.

"Somewheres around," said Gus.

Sam did not speak. He just smiled.

"You're the meanest man in the world, Sam Slater!" burst out Birdie. Her anger was a flaming thing as hot as the fire it- self.

"Shet your mouth, gal young un!" muttered Slater. "Speak mannerly to your elders!"

"Anybody that won't help, but leaves fire fightin' to womenfolks ..."

Birdie went on.

"I'll go help!" Mrs. Slater rushed out from the door. "I'll go help my neighbors when they're in trouble!"

"Woman, you come right back here!" ordered Sam Slater. His wife turned and went obediently back into the house.

Birdie slapped her horse and rode off. "The meanest man in the world!" she kept saying. "He jest wants to burn us out!" Then she remembered the note. Of course that was it. "Will Git you yet iffen we got to burn you out'" it had said. She understood now. Slater had been determined ever since the first, to drive them back to the place they had come from. He was trying to burn them out, like he said.

It was while she was galloping home that Birdie remembered the little girls. They were playing in the palmetto tunnel.

The palmetto clumps were so large and dense, they completely shut out the sun, and the children had made rooms under them. They liked to play house there, it was so shady and cozy.

They had found old boards to make seats and tables, and beds for their play-dollies. They had places to keep all their treasures-old bottles and scraps of broken glass and dishes.

Essie and Zephy Slater were there now with Dovey and Bunny.

They would not be able to see the fire or smell the smoke. The fire would trap them. The dry bristling palmetto leaves would burn like lightwood. Birdie's heart quaked. No one would think of the children. They would all be so busy fighting fire, even Buzz and Pa, when they came.

Birdie pounded Osceola and rode faster. When she reached home, she pulled up the horse and stared. The house was still standing, unharmed. The stepladder still stood by the outer wall, half of which shone pearly white in the midday sun. Pa and Buzz had come back and she saw with relief that they had the fire under control. It had moved far over to the right, beyond the farm buildings, into the scrub.

"The Slaters purely won't come, Pa!" cried Birdie. "He set the fire hisself and was tryin' to burn us out!" Then Birdie saw that the fire was burning hot and crackling furiously round the clump of palmettos, the beginning of the tunnel.

"Pal" she screamed hoarsely. "The children! They're playin' in the palmettos!"

They all ran. Pa brought an armful of wet sacks. Buzz carried the children out of the tunnel one at a time, wet sacks thrown over them. Ma poured water on the burning roots.

Dovey and Bunny were scared but unharmed. Essie and Zephy cried from fright. They were very dirty and black from the smoke. Birdie took them all out on the back porch and washed them clean. The fire moved on and the danger was over, though many pine trees kept burning for days and the smell of pine filled the air.

Ma sent Birdie to take the Slater girls home.

"I'll look see can I find Speckle and her biddies first," said Birdie. When she could not find them in the house or the yard, she decided to hunt for them in the woods on her way to the Slaters.

It was an impossible task to try and locate a hen and her chicks in the burned-off woods. Birdie watched until Essie and Zephy reached their front porch safely. She had no wish to go nearer their house. She never wanted to see any of the Slaters again.

She followed a pig trail, looking for Speckle. Through the woods she came upon dead snakes, small animals and ground-nesting birds that had been burned in the fire. She walked on awhile and then heard voices. A crowd of people had gathered and were talking. She hurried through the blackened grass to the place where they were. It looked familiar and yet she scarcely recognized it.

Then she saw that it was the schoolyard. There was the pump by the trough. There was the boys' baseball field. There was the rope swing under the live oak tree. But the school- house was gone. It was burned to the ground. It had caught from the grass fire and was now only a heap of hot, smoking coals and ashes. Birdie forgot the loss of hen and biddies, in the light of this new calamity. She wanted to go back to school again. She had heard that Miss Annie Laurie Dunnaway was to be the new teacher.

The people were talking about Sam Slater. Nobody said that he had started the fire. But somebody remarked that his boys had fought the man teacher and had broken up the school, because Mr. Pearce had moved away.

"I tell you what!" Birdie could not keep still. "Our house was fixin' to burn up, and 1 rode over to Slaters' to ask'em to come help, and they wouldn't never come! They tipped their chairs agin the wall and jest set! Sam Slater's the meanest man in the world!"

Nobody answered her. No one gave her the support she expected. She looked around in dismay.

Then she saw the reason. There stood Shoestring. He had heard every word she said. The people looked from her to the boy, to see how he would take it.

They were cowards. She was not.

Shoestring stared fiercely at her with his black, beady eyes, but she did not care. She stared back at him.

"Now you won't mess up with no school, Jefferson Davis Slater!" she said in a good loud voice. "Nor learn to read nor write, will you!'

"No!" said Shoestring. He dropped his eyes and in his voice there was a note of sadness. "Now they ain't no more school to go to, I wisht I might could go."

Barney Barnum, the horse trader, was in the square. He at- tended all public gatherings and was always in town on Saturdays.

A crowd had gathered round him.

"Give boot, take boot!" shouted Barney. "I’ll swap, sell or buy!" He had a shaggy spotted pony on the end of his rope. "Swap, sell or buy!" he kept repeating in a loud voice.

Mr. Boyer and Birdie hurried over. Pa pulled the cow behind him.

After Semina died, Pa needed a mule badly. There was too much work for Osceola to do. The frequent trips to town alone were enough for the horse's strength. A good work mule was a necessity. So, as soon as the strawberry crop was harvested, Pa felt he could afford one. He decided to trade in a cow, and pay some cash if necessary. His fenced-in pasture was not large enough to accommodate a large herd, and he felt he had more cows than he needed. He preferred to be a farmer and nor a cattleman.

Birdie looked at the horse trader's pony.

"But we want a mule!'' she whispered to her father.

"You mighty right," said Pa. "But he'll trade four or five times before the day's over. We'll wait, sec what comes in."

"Looka here what a nice horse," cried the horse trader. "She's a Florida-raised little horse. She's been broke a little, she can work. Last evenin' I hooked her up to that drag out there and I went round the block three times before I could stop her. I tell you, she tore out with me and nigh killed me!"

The crowd laughed.

"Swap, sell or buy!" shouted Barney.

A man leading a mule began to dicker.

"Don't you worry, she don't buck!" insisted Barney.

The man's ten-year-old son ran up, threw himself on the horse's back and tried to ride her.

"Don't get her excited now," cried Barney. "She might buck after all!"

The crowd laughed again.

"Swap, sell or buy!" called Barney.

Soon the animals changed hands. The man handed his mule to Barney, then he and his son rode off on the horse's back.

"Thank you, sir!" shouted Barney after them. "You stoled you a good horse! Who wants to swap this here little ole mule!"

"Hit's a mule, Pa!" whispered Birdie. "Now's your chance.'·

"We don't want ary mule like that un, hone\·.l said Pa, shaking his head.

"One-eyed, by Jerusalem!" cried Barney Barnum. "Goes to prove I always git the worst of the bargain." He looked the mule over. "I reckon she's moon-eyed. She can see out of her left eye--all she needs is a pair of specs. But, outside of that. she's sound. Swap, sell or buy!"

A newcomer turned in a cow and led the mule away. "Get her out of here, hope I'I1 never lay eyes on her again!" called Barney. "You-all's killin' a man right now, gittin' the best of ary deal I make. Iffen you got a sick hog or cow or mule, jest leave it to home. When you know your horse's fixin' to die, take it somewheres else. Dent bring it to Barney Brown to swap!"

The black cow was so thin, Barney said he could see through her. She was balky too, and had to be pulled and slapped and pushed. Barney's arguments fell on empty air, and it was some time before the cow found an owner. Then a man from Kissimmee brought up a brown mule. This time, Mr. Boyer stepped forward.

Barney began his harangue: "Work anywhere you want to put her. Six years old and I don't mean seven. She's not an out- law, she wont fight you, kick you or bite you! Best little mule in the whole state of Floridy. Just talk to her, whisper to her and she'll do what you say. Works anywhere, not a thing wrong with her, sound as a gold doubloon!"

Boyer opened the mule's mouth and looked at her teeth.

"Have a look! Hit won't cost you nothin' extra!" shouted Barney. "Have two looks at Kissimmee, the mule! See by her teeth how young she is. I guarantee her the youngest. strongest, workingest mule in the entire United States."

The mule was a good one. Other buyers recognized it, came up and made offers. Barney stopped talking to look over the animals offered in trade. When Boyer pulled a gold piece out of his pocket and offered it to boot, besides his cow, the horse trader did not hesitate.

"Done!" he shouted. "The trade is made. Go git you a new plow, sir, run git your croppin' done, and you're a rich man!

When Pa came away, leading a big brown mule by the rope, Birdie could not help but think of Semina. Poor, thin, bony, friendly old Seminal It would seem strange to have a brown mule instead of a white one. The new mule was strong and fat and sleek, but just as gentle. Birdie patted her on the nose. "Hello, Kissimmee!" she said. "Pa, let's call her Kissimmee, 'cause she came from there."

"Shore!" said Pa. "Mighty fine ole Indian name. Jest suits her. "

They tied the mule to the back of the wagon and started for home.

"I hope Slater won't poison this mule, Pa," said Birdie.

"He better not!" said Pa. "We'll keep her locked up in the barn when we're not workin' her."

"Looks like Slater's drunk most all the time lately," said Birdie. "First he poisoned Semina, then he set the grass fire and burned the schoolhouse down. What's he fixin' to do next!"

"Ary man drinks all the time is shore to come to a bad end," said Pa. "He hurts other folks, but he hurts hisself most. Iffen he don't change his ways, he'll suffer for all the harm he's done."

"You ain't fixin' to kill no more of his hogs, be you, Pa!" asked Birdie.

"Can't promise!" said Pa grimly. "He jest better not come messin' round my purty brown mule, is all I say!"

"Reckon we better not tell the Slaters we got us a new mule," said Birdie thoughtfully.

They reached home at midday and all the family came running out to meet them.

"Her name's Kissimmee!" said Birdie proudly. "She come from there, so I named her."

They crowded round the new brown mule and admired her. They all said how much fatter and younger she was than old Semina, and what a good worker she would be. Suddenly Birdie saw the little Slater girls coming toward her, out of the palmetto tunnel.

"Slaters!" she cried, pointing. She wished she had an apron on, big enough to cover the brown mule and hide her from sight.

But she could only pull the mule away quickly in the direction of the barn.

"Tell them Slater gals to go along home!" she called to Dan, as she ran. But when she came back to the house, there they were, standing in the breezeway.

"I done tole you to go home," she said harshly. "Don't want you to come round here never no more."

"We come to ..." began Essie timidly.

"Tell me one thing and mind you tell me the truth. Did you see what we brung from town!" demanded Birdie fiercely. "Did you see what 1 was leadin' by the rope!"

"A new mule!" said Essie.

"A brown mule, 'stid of a white one!" said Zephy.

They had seen it, of course. She hadn't been quick enough to hide Kissimmee from their sight as she had hoped. Birdie leaned down, pointed her finger at them and spoke sternly.

"Don't you never tell your Pa or your Ma or anybody else we got us a new mule!" she said. "You never seen no mule at all.

Hear! You don't know we got us a new one. Hear! All you know is our ole white mule is dead, and your Pa poisoned it.

Hear!"

"You aint got no mule," said Essie obediently.

"Your ole white mule is dead," said Zephy. "Mind now! And go on home!" ordered Birdie. "Go along home and stay there.

Dent you never come back again!"

But the little girls would not budge.

"We want to see your Ma," they insisted.

Birdie took them tightly by the hands and led them into the house. Mrs. Boyer was stirring up cornbread for dinner. She glanced at the girls. "Iffen hit's soap your Ma wants," she said sharply, "tell her I ain't got none till I go to town and buy me some. Iffen hit's sugar, tell her I can't spare her none, till she brings back what she borrowed before."

"She don't want no soap," said Essie.

"She don't want no sugar," said Zephy.

"What do she want then!" asked Mrs. Boyer, out of patience.

Essie swallowed hard, then she spoke as if she had learned a piece by rote: "Ma's fixin' to have a chicken pilau down on the branch." In backwoods fashion, she pronounced the word per-low. "She bids you-all to come."

"A chicken pilau!" cried Mrs. Boyer in surprise. "You mean she's inviting us!"

"Yes, ma'am," said Essie. "Shoestring's gone around to bid all the other neighbors to come. This evenin', all evenin' and tonight, at the branch down back of our house."

"I don't understand," said Mrs. Boyer. "Your folks is mad at us. Ever since Mr. Boyer whopped Shoestring, they ain't spoke to us. Your Pa poisoned our mule. Then he refused to help us put out the grass fire, when our house like to burned up. Now you invite us to come and frolic. We purely can't."

"They jest want us to overlook all the mean things they done done to us!" broke in Birdie angrily "We don't go to any doin's at their house, do we!"

"Ma ain't mad at you," said Essie.

"And Pa's gone away," added Zephy. "Ma said likely he won't be back for two-three days."

"Where's he gone to!" asked Mrs. Boyer.

"We don't know," said Essie. "He always goes off when he gits rarin'."

Mrs. Boyer hesitated. What did all this mean!

"Ma thought likely you'd help her dress the chickens," said Zephy, " 'count of she's got all of them to do."

"All of them? What did she kill all of'em for! Don't she know how many folks is comin'!" asked Mrs. Boyer, more and more puzzled.

"Well," said Essie, "Pa shot the heads offen all of Ma's chickens and . ."

"What!" exclaimed Mrs. Boyer.

"So Ma's fixing to have a chicken pilau!" added Zephy.

"What did he do that for!' gasped Mrs. Boyer.

"He was drunk," said Essie. She hung her head, ashamed.

"He practiced hittin' the mark, to show what a good shot he was, even when he was drunk," said Zephy. "And now Ma ain't got no more chickens."

"And no more egg money," added Mrs. Boyer.

"Likely he was drunk when he poisoned Semina," said Birdie.

"I reckon so," said Ma. "That pore woman!" She opened the oven door and shoved the cornbread inside. She turned to the girls. "Tell your Ma we're shore obliged, and will be glad to come."

The chicken pilau was a gay and happy occasion. The Tatums, the Marshes and the Dorseys came, besides the Boyers.

It was pleasantly cool under the trees along by the trick- ling stream which was always spoken of as "the branch." The men cleared an open space and built lightwood fires and put on great kettles of water to heat. The women dressed the chickens, cut them up and boiled them. They put on rice to cook. Later the chickens and rice were cooked together with rich seasoning to make the favorite backwoods dish--chicken pilau. While the meal was in preparation, the men went off hunting and fishing, and the children played games. Lank Tatum brought his mouth organ and furnished music for the dancing that followed after dark.

"Through it all Mrs. Slater was as quiet and easy as could be.

She told everybody what her husband had done, and they admired her for her spirit. Slater's absence was a great relief.

After the others had gone, Mrs. Slater fell into Mrs. Boyer's arms and cried a little.

"There, there now, hit's all over,'' said Mrs. Boyer, "and they all done had a good time."

"Nothin' like a frolic," said Mrs. Slater tearfully, "to ease the spirit."

"I'd a buried the dead chickens, had it been me," said Mrs. Boyer, "and not let anybody know."

"Hit seemed so wasteful," said Mrs. Slater. "Most of them hens layin' too. But when he gits to rompin' and rarin', I don't pay no mind. Then purty soon he goes off to git sobered up."

"Mis' Slater," said Mrs. Boyer, "I'm right sorry 'bout them hogs. Bihu's someways hot-tempered and he was mad. But he didn't belong to kill them three hogs of your'n. That's what started all the trouble, I reckon."

The women sat on buckskin rockers on the front porch, Mrs. Slater with her baby on her lap and Birdie leaned against her mother's knee. The whippoorwills were calling and the moon shone with a clear brilliance.

"Things is goin' from bad to worse," sighed Mrs. Slater. "Iffen hit ain't one thing, hit's two-he's drinkin' so much."

"He won't stop!" asked Mrs. Boyer.

"Nothin' can't stop ary habit like that ..."

"Exceptin' to take the liquor away. Where do he get it?"

"The Lord only knows," said Mrs. Slater. "Spends all his money for it. Never gives none to his family. I)o our clothes git wore out more, they'll fall off us in rags. I been usinl my egg money for calico for my dresses and overalls for the boys, and now hit's gone."

"This can't go on," said Mrs. Boyer. "Him drinkin' all the time, and our men quarrelin' over hogs and cows. We're neighbors and we belong to live peaceable."

"You mighty right," sighed Mrs. Slater.

"Did the young uns tell you how we saved 'em from the grass fire, ma'am!" asked Birdie.

Mrs. Slater had heard nothing about it, so Mrs. Boyer told her the story. She rocked back and forth in her chair. "I'm shore obliged," she said. Then she began to cry. "He done set that fire to burn you folkses out and send you back to Caroliny where you come from."

"I mean!" said Mrs. Boyer. "We like to burnt up, but we ain't goin' back."

They rocked awhile in silence.

"I hear they're fixin' to hold Camp Meetin' down to Ellis's Picnic Grounds," said Mrs. Slater. "I'd admire to hear some of the preachin'. There's nothin' I relish more'n a good noisy sermon. You reckon we might could go!"

"Why yes," said Mrs. Boyer. "It would pleasure us, too. Do you have no other way to go, we'll take you-all with us."

"Iffen Sam would only go too ..." began Mrs. Slater.

"Hit would do him a heap of good," added Mrs. Boyer.

"Ever since I bought me that Bible from the Bible-sellin' feller," said Mrs. Slater, "I been thinkin' we belong to git more religion. "

"We all belong to git more," said Mrs. Boyer, "to learn how to love our neighbor."

"Sam, he sometimes goes to the church doin's," said Mrs. Slater, "but he don't pay no mind to the preacher."