“Yes, suh, dat me,” the negro replied. “Mr. Hillyer, de overseer fer my boss, set me on dis yer job. I want ter clean it up ter de branch by Sadday.” “Huh!” The man approached nearer, eying the negro closely from head to foot, his glance resting longer on Pete's hip-pocket than anywhere else. “Huh! I heard down at the store just now that you'd left--throwed up your job, I mean--an' gone clean off.” “No, I hain't throwed up no job,” the negro said, his slow intelligence groping for the possible cause of such a report. “I been right here since my boss sent me over, en I'm gwine stay lessen he sen' fer me ter tek care o' his hosses in town. I reckon you heard er Marse Carson Dwight's fine drivin' stock.” The farmer pulled his long brown beard, his eyes still on Pete's face; it was as if he had not caught the boy's last remark. “They said down at the store that you left last night, after--that you went off last night. A man said he seed you at the nigger blow-out on Hilton's farm about one o'clock, and that after it was over you turned towards--I don't know--I'm just tellin' you what they said down at the store.” “I _was_ at dat shindig,” Pete said. “I walked fum here dar en back ergin.” “Huh, well”--the farmer's face took on a shrewd expression--“I must move on. I'm lookin' fer a brown cow with a white tail, an' blaze on 'er face.” As the man disappeared in the wood, Pete was conscious of a sense of vague uneasiness which somehow seemed to be a sort of augmented recurrence of the feeling left by the warning of his early visitor. “Dat white man certainly act curi's,” Pete mused, as he leaned on the handle of his hoe and stared at the spot where the farmer had disappeared in the woods. “I'll bet my hat he been thinkin', lak Uncle Rich' said dey would, dat I had er hand in dat bloody business. Po' Miz Johnson--I reckon dey layin' 'er out now. She certney was good. I remember how she tol' me at de spring de day I come here ter try en be a good, steady boy en not mek dem white men pounce on me ergin. Po' 'oman! Seem lak er gre't pity. I reckon Abe Johnson got what was comin' ter 'im, but it look lak even Sam Dudlow wouldn't er struck dat good'oman down. Maybe he thought he had ter--maybe she cornered 'im; but I dunno; he's er tough nigger--de toughest I ever run ercross, en I've seed er lots um.” Pete leaned on the fence, wiped his perspiring brow with his bare hand, snapped his fingers like a whip to rid them of the drops of sweat, and allowed his thoughts to merge into the darker view of the situation. He was really not much afraid. Under grave danger, a negro has not so great a concern over death as a white man, because he is not endowed with sufficient intelligence to grasp its full import, and yet to-day Pete was feeling unusual qualms of unrest.