"Yes, my father was a white man. He was a German just come over to this country. He had a beer saloon in a New Hampshire town—at least he bought it afterwards. He worked in the saloon when my mother, who had run away from Kentucky, was hired to work in his employer’s house. He boarded there and she was treated something like a member of the family, although she was a servant, and they were married after awhile. Some few of the people didn’t like it, I’ve heard mammy say, but they got along without any trouble; and when my father saved up some money he bought the little saloon from his employer and made some little money before he died. We had a hard enough time getting it, though, goodness knows. I moved back to New Hampshire from Ohio after your father’s death in order to push the case through the—" "Yes, yes, I’ve heard that before," said Hayward; "but tell me about your mother’s running away from her master. You have never told me anything about her, except that her name was Cindy or Lucinda, and that she belonged to General Young." "Well, honey, she was just a slave girl that belonged to General Young over in Kentucky. She ran away and got across the river without being caught, and some of the white people helped her to get on as far as New Hampshire and got her that place to work where my father boarded. She and my father were—" "Yes, yes, I know," the son interrupted again, "but what made her run away and leave her father and mother—did she know her father and mother?" "I don’t know that I remember it all," said the mother evasively, "and it doesn’t make any difference anyway." "Oh, well, go on and tell what you know or have heard. Let’s get at the bottom of it. I declare I believe you don’t like my being a negro any better than those dudes in the 71st." The mother laughed at his statement; and seemed pleased at the interruption, for she made no move to proceed with the narrative. Graham looked at her quietly a few moments, and, ascribing her reticence to unwillingness to descant upon the negro element in her ancestry, which was indeed a part but a very small part of her motive, repeated his demand for information sharply. "Oh, honey," cried his mother, "don’t ask me any more about it. I just made mammy tell me all about her father and mother and her running away from Kentucky, and I wish to the Lord I never had! It was just awful." "So! Well, now I must know. Go on and tell it. The quicker you do the sooner it will be over. Go on, I say. What was your mother’s father named?" "Gumbo—Guinea Gumbo." "Poetic name that! And her mother’s name, what was it?" "Big Lize." "Not so poetic, though it sounds like some poetry I’ve read, too. And now what did this pair do or suffer that was so terrible? It’s no use dodging any longer."