Two powerful hands gripped his shoulders and flung him back against the wall. He opened his eyes wide and looked into a face of such cold ferocity that his loose lips emitted a sudden “Oh, Jedus!” and he became immediately sober, and very much afraid. Then Maria poured into his ears words that had the heat and dead weight of molten lead. “Now I goin’ lock yuh up in dat closet till de ribber boat is back at de wharf,” she concluded. “Den I goin’ let yuh loose. But I all de time goin’ be where I kin git my hand on yuh again. Ef yuh ebber tells Porgy, or any libbin’ soul, dat yuh ain’t deliber dat message tuh Lody, I goin’ tuh hab nigger blood on my soul w’en I stan’ at de jedgement. Now yuh gots dat straight in yuh head?” Mingo nodded assent. He was beyond the power to speak. The big negress jerked him suddenly to his feet, propelled him across the room and into the stygian recesses of the closet. Then she slammed the door, turned the immense iron key in the lock, and dropped it in her pocket. “Well, dat’s dat!” she remarked, as she wiped a moist, mystified face upon a corner of her apron. “Mus’ hab been Jedus done um atter all.” Then, as though to dismiss the matter, she added: “No, I be damn ef he did. He ain’t gots it in um.” IV [Illustration] PART IV It was the day set for the grand parade and picnic of “The Sons and Daughters of Repent Ye Saith the Lord,” and, with the first light of morning, Catfish Row had burst into a fever of preparation. Across the narrow street, the wharf, from which the party was to leave, bustled and seethed with life. A wagon rattled out to the pier-head and discharged an entire load of watermelons. Under the vigilant eyes of a committee a dozen volunteers lifted the precious freight from the vehicle, and piled it ready for the steamer. From behind the next pier, with a frenzied threshing of its immense stern paddle, came the excursion boat. Tall open exhaust funnels flanked the walking-beam, and coughed great salmon-colored plumes of steam into the faint young sunlight. A fierce torrent of wood-smoke gushed from the funnel and went tumbling away across the harbor. Painters were hurled, missed, coiled, and hurled again. Then, amid a babblement of advice and encouragement, the craft was finally moored in readiness for the Lodge.