“He’s makin’ arrangements to marrify it,” Figger wailed. “Dar’s a great big ole cow of a woman out dar whut owns five hundred dollars. Her paw an’ maw is talkin’ it aroun’ an’ dey’s huntin’ somebody dat’ll marry her fer her money.” “Is she as bad lookin’ as all dat?” “Shore is. She looks like a puddin’ dat riz too high an’ spreads out too much. She kinder comes outen her clothes an’ rolls over de edges of a chair an’ de big of her ’pears like it’s boilin’ over all de sides all de time.” “I ketch on,” Skeeter grinned. “She jes’ out-niggers herse’f by bein’ so fat.” “Pap’ll take her ef he kin git her,” Figger sighed. “He ain’t pertickler. He wants money to start a saloon.” “Us’ll bofe close up dis saloon to-night an’ go out an’ take a look on,” Skeeter announced. “Dis town kin do without two nigger saloons. One is a plum’ plenty. Who is dis here nigger woman anyhow?” “She’s ole Isaiah Gaitskill’s stepchile,” Figger informed him. “She takes atter her maw in fat-hood. She’s a widder woman an’ her deceasted husbunt left her a lot of insurance dollars.” “Gosh!” Skeeter sighed in desperation. “Pap Curtain an’ a widder woman! Two ag’in’ one—I ain’t got no show. Life ain’t fitten to live no more.” II PLEASURE AND PROFIT In the evening Skeeter Butts followed Figger out to the old tabernacle grounds and was amazed at the transformation of the place. Wash Jones had moved many of the benches out of the building and had placed them under trees and in the groves. He had made sawdust trails from the tabernacle to the edge of the lake, to the Shin Bone eating-house, and to all other places where a little money could be coaxed from the pocket of the pleasure-seeker. He had made a dancing-floor in a part of the tabernacle, arranging seats around it for the sightseers. He had erected refreshment-booths in other portions of the building, and also a band-stand, where the sweating, hard-worked black Tickfall brass band was having the most hilarious time of their lives. Negroes had come in from the plantations for miles around. Horses were tied to all the trees, wagons and buggies were sheltered in the woods, and a great mob of folks moved up and down the sawdust avenues or tramped the woods, shouting, laughing, cutting monkey-shines, and eating popcorn balls, hot dogs, and sandwiches made of fried catfish. It was a noisy, boisterous, rollicking place which Skeeter entered. Ordinarily Skeeter would have been the center of the whole thing. But this affair had slipped up on him and had suddenly developed business complications and his mind was too occupied with his troubles to enjoy the fun going on around him.