Down through the drowsing town edge they stepped, giving alarm only to the chickens that scratched languidly where scrub-oaks cast a skimpy shade across the road; but as they reached the town line they passed a clutter of negro cabins clustering about a little doggery. A negro woman stepped to a door and saw them. Distractedly, fluttering like a hen, she ran into the bare, grassless yard, setting up a hysterical outcry. A negro man came quickly from the cabin, clapped his hand over her mouth and dragged her back inside, slamming the door to behind him with a kick of his bare foot. Unseen hands shut the other cabin doors and the woman's half-smothered cries came dimly through the clapboarded wall; but a slim black darky darted southward from the doggery, worming his way under a broken, snaggled fence and keeping the straggling line of houses and stables between him and the marchers. This fleeing figure was Jeff, Judge Priest's negro bodyservant, who had a most amazing faculty for always being wherever things happened. Jeff was short and slim and he could run fast. He ran fast now, snatching off his hat and carrying it in his hand--the surest of all signs that a negro is traveling at his top gait. A good eighth of a mile in advance of the mob, he shot in at the back door of the courthouse and flung himself into his employer's room. “Jedge! Jedge!” he panted tensely. “Jedge Priest, please, suh, wake up--the mobbers is comin'!” Judge Priest came out of his nap with a jerk that uprighted him in his chair. “What's that, boy?” “The w'ite folks is conin' after that there little nigger over in the jail. I outrun 'em to git yere and tell you, suh.” “Ah-hah!” said Judge Priest, which was what Judge Priest generally said first of all when something struck him forcibly. He reared himself up briskly and reached for his hat and umbrella. “Which way are they comin' from?” he asked as he made for the hall and the front door. “Comin' down the planin'-mill road into Jefferson Street,” explained Jeff, gasping out the words. As the old judge, with Jeff in his wake, emerged from the shadows of the tall hallway into the blinding glare of the portico they met Dink Bynum, the deputy jailer, just diving in. Dink was shirtsleeved. His face was curiously checkered with red-and-white blotches. He cast a backward glance, bumped into the judge's greater bulk and caromed off, snatching at the air to recover himself. “Are you desertin' your post, Dink?” demanded the judge. “Jedge, there wasn't no manner of use in my stayin',” babbled Bynum. “I'm all alone and there's a whole big crowd of 'em comin' yonder. There'll git that nigger anyhow--and he deserves it!” he burst out. “Dink Bynum, where are the keys to that jail?” said Judge Priest, speaking unusually fast for him. “I clean forgot'em!” he quavered. “I left 'em hangin' in the jail office.”