Head down and shoulders hunched, in the manner of one harkening to inner voices, Jeff betook himself around the corner of the back porch. Once out of her sight, though, he flung from him his mien of absorption. The overture had been rendered; there remained much to be done before the curtain rose. The languorous shade invited one to tarry and rest, but Jeff breasted the sunshine, going hither and yon upon his errands. Back of a cabin on Plunket's Hill he had private conference with one Gumbo Rollins, by profession a carnival concessionaire and purveyor of amusements in a small way. No cash actually changed hands, but on Jeff's part there was a promise of moneys to be paid in the event of certain as-yet-problematical contingencies. Next he sought for and, at the Bleeding Heart restaurant, found a limber individual named Tecumseh Sherman Glass, called Cump for short. This Tecumseh Sherman Glass was a person of two trades and one outstanding trait. By day a short-order cook, by night he played in 'Gustus Hillman's Colored String Band. It is to be marked down in the reader's memory that the instrument he played was the saxophone; also that he was heavily impregnated with that form of professional jealousy which lurks in the souls of so many _artistes_; likewise that he was a member in fair standing of the Rev. A. Risen Shine's congregation, and, finally, that he was a born meddler in other folks' affairs. These facts all should be borne in mind; they have their value. With Tecumseh Sherman Glass, Jeff spent some time in a confidential exchange of words. Here, again, the matter of a subsequent financial reward, to be paid by the party of the first part, meaning Jeff, to the party of the second part, meaning Cump, following the satisfactory outcome of sundry developments, was arranged. Would there were space to tell how cunningly, how craftily Jeff, in the subtleties marking this interview, played upon three chords in the other's being--the chord of vengeful envy, the chord of malice, the chord of avarice. There is not space. Four o'clock found the plotter entering the parlor of what once had been the establishment of T. Marshall, undertaker, now the Elite Colored Funeral Home, Marshall & Kivil, proprietors. These transformations had dated from the time Percy C. Kivil (Tuskegee '18) entered the firm. Here was no plain undertaker. Here was an expert and a graduate mortician, with diploma to prove it; also one gifted of the pen. Two inscriptions done in flowing type hung on the wall. One of these inscriptions read: Oh, Death, where is thy sting When we officiates? Embalming done attentively At standard pre-war rates. And the other: Blest be the tie that binds! Tho death thy form may shake. Call in a brother of thy race And let him undertake!