"Well, Ephriam," Gran'dad slapped the new gray jeans that covered his thin legs, with a prolonged cackle of derisive mirth, "you wouldn't be no fust rate hand to kerry on a funeral--you'd tickle the ondertaker. They don't have none them buoys in Texas. They don't live nowhars but in _Africy_!" Mr. Doggett rubbed his narrow forehead reflectively, ignoring the correction. "Whar is hit them mare-maids lives, er is hit _marry-maids_? I fergit the name. Keerby, he said he seed a pair o' 'em onct--in Floridy Gulf hit must 'a' been. He said they had a woman head and a fish body hitched onto hit somehow, and ever' scale on the fish part wuz as beeg as a sasser, and a shinin' like the sun! He said he never looked at 'em perticular _clos_, considerin' they wuzn't dressed fer company ner cold weather, but they wuz ondoubtedly the purtiest creeters a body ever seed!" "Did Keerby mention anytheng that _wuz_ dressed fer winter out thar?" asked Gran'dad with a covert wink at Mr. Brock. "Well, Keerby, he said they wuz b'ars--them kind that'll hug like a courtin' feller, and their meat's as sweet as a courtin' feller's tongue. Keerby says you can p'intedly eat all the b'ar's fat you can git around ef you pepper and salt hit right good, and instid o' sickenin' you, hit'll fatten you." "Keerby'll never see as much b'ar's fat ner nothin' else as he can git around!" jeered Gran'dad. "I'm afeerd he won't," agreed Mr. Doggett. "I'd 'a' kept him longer, he had sech a good sleight at turnin' off work,--done more'n three thirds o' the feedin' ginerally, and ever'theng else accordin'--but the old lady 'lowed she wuzn't goin' to be et out o' house and home ef _I_ wuz. Onct he et so long I thought I'd have to hitch up the team and pull him away from the table." Dock, the twelve-year-old, small and scrawny, but tough as a hickory withe, who had up to this time lain stretched on his front by a hollow log, skilfully executing with his barlow a colony of ants as fast as they crawled from the rotting section of buckeye, gave a wicked glance at the slender and hollow-cheeked man of fifty sitting near him. "Mr. Lindsay, he ort to have some o' that b'ar's fat Keerby wuz a tellin' about to make him sortie plump up and look purty to Miss Lucy." A slow red crept into Mr. Lindsay's sensitive face. "I don't reckon I need any bear's fat yit, Dock," his voice was low and gentle: "My mother always told me whatever I done, never to starve a woman, and I ain't ready to starve one yit, ef I could git one to have me." Mrs. Doggett who had come out again with her improvised chip baskets, turned toward him, her black eyes sparkling mischievously.