A gleam came into his eye. He in his pulpit, in the midst of his people, and the white woman down there alone...! Almost alone too, now, in that part of the state: ten Negroes all about her now to every poverty-stricken white...! He within his rights, and she a trespasser...! His voice rolled out over her like a river: “Yer got ter pull off from de goats! Yer got ter come inter de fold!” He chanted like a warrior leading hosts, with a rhythm as heavily marked as the beating of a drum. “Ah been down yander in de canebrake, a-lookin’ fer dem goats--a-studyin’ in mah min’ an’ a-wrastlin’ in mah soul! Ah been down yander in de canebrake, an’ what yer think Ah see?” A moan of anticipation--pleasure and horror and fear--ran over his human harp strings. “What yer see, brudder?” “Glory, hallelujah!” “Praise de name er Jesus!” “What yer see?” “Ah done see de Devil, de big, black, shiny Devil, a-scorchin’ up de canebrake wid his breath!” A bass voice began to moan heavily. An alto joined. Others took it up, improvising with a sure sense of harmony an elaborate background for Draper’s trampling barytone. “His tail was long an’ shiny lak’ er blacksnake! His eyes was lak’ de haidlights on de train!” Woodie shut his eyes and prayed. The long-continued pound of emotion had beaten from him all acquired white folks’ methods of speech and feeling. “Gawd gimme strength,” he prayed, “ter shoot um through de heart ef Ah have ter!” The trampling barytone went on: “His feet was p’inted lak’ er crowbar an’ cloven in de midst, an’ his mouth was lak’ et watermillon full er seeds!” Woodie sat there stiff and cold with sweat, in his excitement almost as white as a white boy. He looked childlike and harmless and pitiful, but he was the most dangerous kind of potential murderer: the determined coward, rapt out of himself past the reach of reason; ready to shoot when Draper’s words should pull the trigger. Draper’s words crept toward it steadily. “His long white teeth was a-champin’ an’ a-scrunchin’ an’ a-gnashin’--_fer dem goats_!” He got his people rocking and moaning to the drunken rhythm of his feelings and his words. He got them ten thousand miles away from the mind of the white woman, so that her lonely, pale face in their midst seemed strange and unnatural. And suddenly, under cover of the eerie din, he dropped like a waiting eagle straight for his prey: “An’ de Devil say ter me: ‘_Whar’s dat backslider?_’” _Tap, tap, tap_, insisted the cane, steady and sharp. Woodie moved farther from his mother, for elbow room. Tiny beads of sweat broke out on Draper’s face, but he didn’t swerve. “‘_Whar’s de man dat laid his ’ligion down?_’” “Gawd gimme strength!” Woodie prayed. “‘He ain’t so dark,’ de Devil say, ‘an’ he ain’t so light.’” Woodie cocked the old pistol in his pocket. “‘He’s middle-sized,’ de Devil say, ‘an’ he’s got er limp----’” Woodie leaned forward to shoot, but Miss Jinny was on her feet.