“Yes, Mr. Vance. He swar’d us both; then writ down all we said, read it over ter us, and we put our names ter it, an’ ’t was witnessed all right. The feller Burgess bahcked us up by sayin’ he see us in the water jest afore the gal fell, which was all true. It seemed a plain case. The judge tell’d it all ter Mr. Berwick, an’ he growed sort o’ wild, an’ died soon arter. What bekummed of _you_ all that time, Mr. Vance?” “I landed on the Arkansas side,” said Vance. “I supposed the Berwick family all lost. The bodies of the parents I saw and identified, and Burgess told me he’d talked with two men who saw the child go down.” “Wall, Mr. Vance. Thar ain’t much more uv a story. We went ter Memphis. The Kunnle swelled round consid’rable, and got his name inter the newspapers. But the yuller gal she was sort o’ cracked-brained. She war no use ter us or ter the child. The Kunnle got low-sperreted. He’d made a bad spec, ahter all. He’d lost his niggers; an’ the yuller gal, she as he hoped ter sell in Noo Orleenz fur sixteen hunderd dollars, she turned out a fool. Howzomever, he found a lightish, genteel sort uv a nigger, a quack doctor, who took her off our hands. He said as how she mowt be ’panned an’ made as good as noo.” “And what did you do with the child?” “Wall, another bright idee hahd struck the Kunnle. Says he, ‘Color this young ’un up a little, and she’d bring risin’ uv four hunderd dollars at a vahndoo. Any mahn, used ter buyin’ niggers, would see at wunst she’d grow up ter be a val’able fancy article. Ef I could afford it, I’d hold her on spekilation till she war fifteen.’ Wall, Mr. Vance, uv all the mean things I ever done, the meanest was to let the Kunnle, whan we got ter Noo Orleenz, take that poor little patient thing, as I had toted all the way down from Memphis, an’ sell her ter the highest bidder.” With an irrepressible groan, Vance walked to the window. When he returned, he looked with pity on Quattles, and said, “Proceed!” “Yer see, Mr. Vance, I owed the Kunnle two hunderd dollars, he’d won from me at euchre. He offered ter make it squar ef I’d give up my int’rest in the child. Wall, I’d got kind o’ fond uv the little thing; an’ ’t wasn’t till I got blind drunk on’t that I could bring my mind ter say yes. The thowt uv what I done that day has kept me drunk most ever sence. But the Kunnle, he tried to comfort me like. Says he, ‘The child was fairly ourn, seein’ as how we saved it from drownin’.’ ‘Don’t take on so, old feller,’ says he. ‘Think yerself lucky ef yer hahvn’t nothin’ wuss nor that agin yerself.’ But ’t was no go. He never could make me hold up my head agin like as I used ter; an’ we two cut adrift, an’ hain’t kept ’count uv each other sence.” “How did he dispose of the child?” “He stained her skin till she looked like a half mulatter, an’ then he jest got Ripper, the auctioneer, ter sell her.” “Who bought the child?”