"So I have piped
him. Ah! that's plumby!"
As the tall man started to go Milburn's countenance relaxed, he wandered
again in his head, and fell back upon the bed.
"I told you he was a hard hater, Mr. Johnson," the Judge remarked.
"Them shakes is the equivvy for the bruise he give me,--that is, till we
both heal up. He's painted the ensigns of all nations on my stummick,
Judge. But a blow is cured by a blow!"
With a look of admiring computation upon the girl Virgie, Joe Johnson
drew his long figure down the stairs, like a pole.
"What a brutal giant," Vesta said; "and how came he to be doing our
errands?"
"Why, Aunt Hominy hadn't nobody to bring the wheelbarrow load, and this
man said he'd come, and he would come, Miss Vesty, so I couldn't say
anything."
"He's a man of a good deal of influence," said the Judge, uneasily, "in
the upper part of our county, and in Delaware. Last night, after the
wedding, he slapped Meshach's hat, and old Samson knocked him down for
it, and he would have killed Samson, I hear, but for your bridegroom,
who felled him with a timely brick. It's a hard team to pass on a narrow
road,--Meshach and Samson; hey, Virgie?"
"I'm glad old Samson beat him, anyway," the pretty quadroon said,
showing her white teeth.
"Oh, what troubles will not that hat bring upon us!" Vesta thought; and
then spoke: "If Mr. Milburn was strong, I think he would hardly let that
man get out of the county before night.
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