Page:Contending Forces by Pauline Hopkins.djvu/65

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"COMING EVENTS CAST SHADOWS."
63

yer own idees, 'cause yer could no more hev got them thoughts through yer thick head than I could. Some one’s been fixin' yer up. Out with it now, an' tell me the whole thing. Ef we's goin' inter this business, we's got to be square on the deal with our fren's. Who's the bottom o' this thing?"

Bill produced a plug of tobacco, offered his friend a chew and took one himself. "What I'm tellin' yer, Hank, is 'tween fren's," said he, chewing and crossing his legs.

"Jes' so," replied Hank.

"I wuz tellin' yer the 'riginater o' this plan, or I wuz about to." Bill paused to spit out some of his tobacco juice on the ground, so that it would not overflow the tank, so to speak, and run out of each corner of his mouth, "Beats all nater, Hank, how a man'll git dead set onter a piece o' caliker."

"Meanin' by that, Bill, that Ans Pollock's got set on some gal."

"Fact!" said Bill, with a wink.

"Who’s?" asked Hank.

"It mote be Mis' Montfort herself, Hank."

"Sho, you don' say, re'lly," said Hank, with a wicked look. "Don' blame him, blamed ef I do. But thet's all the good it'll do him."

Bill cut the air into imaginary circles with his whip, and without taking any notice of his

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