[to be continued.]
[A COMPLICATED PREDICAMENT.]
BY F. B. STANFORD.
Josephus Jones was his name in full, but he was called Seph by familiar acquaintances, and usually designated as "Potter's colored boy." In his stockings he stood about four feet five, was black as ebony, and had an inclination to grin more or less. When in full costume he wore his employer's discarded cowhide boots, a blue flannel shirt, a frock-coat ornamented with brass buttons, and a faded felt hat that had a ragged vent-hole in the crown. Trouble usually slipped from his mind and memory like water from a duck's back; but at the time about to be mentioned he was considerably disturbed because he was not white "like other folks."
The white boys and girls in the Potter neighborhood had been planning several weeks to have a masquerade party in the old red school-house, and Seph desired above all things to have a share in the fun and eatables of the occasion. His color and scanty wardrobe, however, were likely to debar him the privilege.
"It do'n' make no dif'rence nohow," he said to himself, after mature deliberation. "I's gwine to hab a show in dat party one way or nudder."
When the expected day at last arrived, he watched the preparations anxiously all the morning and afternoon. The inside of the school-house was first abundantly trimmed with evergreen, then a stage was erected in one corner for a fiddler, and next a long table was arranged at the back of the room for the refreshments, which were brought in baskets by several of the boys and girls from time to time. Finally the table-cloths were spread, and the girls drew from the mysterious baskets frosted cakes wrapped in tissue-paper, great bloated pies, nuts and raisins, oranges and big bunches of grapes, paper bags filled with candy, and, in fact, a quantity of good things that made Seph's mouth water while he looked in through one of the windows.
At home, late in the afternoon, Job Potter secretly led him up to an unfinished room over the wood-shed, and showed him his mask and outfit, which were hidden away in a barrel. He made Seph try on the mask, the old beaver hat, and the coat, just to see how they were going to look.
"Father is mighty sot on not lettin' me go," said Job, "but I'm a-goin', now, you better believe. Don't say anything, though. Mum's the word."
Seph said that he would take care. But an hour afterward, when he saw the Deacon, as Job's father was familiarly called, come down from the shed chamber, and carry Job's mask and costume to a hiding-place in the barn, he had to lie down behind the wood-pile, and hold both hands over his mouth to keep his laughter from being heard.
At the supper table Deacon Potter announced to the whole family that he did not approve of masquerade parties anyway, and certainly not for young people. Job must just make up his mind to stay at home.
Seph was bringing in the kindling-wood for the morning, and heard the Deacon's command. A few minutes later a great thought took complete possession of him. If Job couldn't go, why shouldn't he go in his place?
"Dar's no reason in de world why I habn't jes' as good a right to go as he hab, an' I's gwine to, sure's my name's Josephus."
He hurried through all the chores, swallowed his supper hastily, and took advantage of the first opportunity to slip away to the barn. After hunting all over the hay-mow, and in every hole and corner he could think of, for the concealed articles, he found them under a basket in the corn crib.
Luckily the moon was just coming up, and the cracks in the barn admitted glimmer enough for him to see where he was, and what he was doing. He very soon exchanged his own garments piece by piece for Job's Sunday suit, which, with the exception of the pantaloons, fitted him very well.
While his teeth chattered, and his whole body trembled with nervous excitement, he put on the mask and the beaver hat. These, together with the coat collar turned up, completely concealed his face, head, and neck; and tucked away in a pocket of the coat there happened to be an old pair of brown cotton gloves Job sometimes wore to meeting, that supplied the last necessity to the disguise. Should it be found out that he wasn't Job, Seph knew very well what his fate would be, and he took care to have every part of his black skin and woolly head thoroughly covered before he ventured forth.
In a very short time he arrived in sight of the school-house lights, and heard the fiddle already under way. Heads were bobbing past the windows in rapid succession, as though all were dancing, and the sounds of mirth and revelling that floated out toward him gave his blood a stimulating tingle.
Not a minute was to be wasted; it was "time already to be in dar 'mong de victuals, an' circ'latin' wid de crowd," he thought, walking up boldly to the door, where a dozen or more boys were watching the arrival of each new-comer.
"Now, then, here we have him!" said one, and for an instant Seph hesitated.
"It's Billy Tarbox," cried another.
"No, 'tain't," said somebody else; "it's Job Potter. Hey, Job, you've got on your go-to-meetin' clothes; you can't fool us."
Seph felt a laugh tickle him clear down to the soles of Job's boots; but he was a trifle nervous also, and consequently suppressed it quickly. Without saying anything, he pushed by them, and entered.
"'HERE'S JOB! HERE'S JOB!' SHOUTED EVERY ONE AT ONCE."
"Here's Job!" "Here's Job!" shouted every one at once; and before Seph could make up his mind what to do, fifteen or twenty boys and girls in masks began to caper around him. As soon as he did collect his scattered wits, however, he decided to play that he was dumb, and refused to speak. That made them laugh, and shortly they left him to greet another arrival.
Nobody, indeed, seemed to have the least suspicion who he really was. They'd "neber cotch him to let dem know, needer," Seph ruminated. He guessed he'd "cut his eye-teeth, an' knew what he was 'bout. When dar was mince-pies 'round, an' stuffed chicken, an' heaps ob good things, jes' lebe him alone."
"But," as the old saying has it, "there is many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip." Before supper-time could draw near, there was a little catastrophe awaiting Seph that he had not counted on.
It arose from the fact that there was a meeting at the church that evening which the Deacon and Mrs. Potter attended, their way lying directly past the school-house. Who ever could have supposed that curiosity would have prompted the two good old people to look in and see what the young folks were about, even though they did not approve of such goings on?
But in the mean time Seph enjoyed himself amazingly. He watched the table longingly; he listened to the fiddle, and danced until he was out of breath; he played chase the squirrel, and had capital fun for an hour or more; then the end was at hand.
While standing in the middle of the floor, hesitating what to take part in next, he happened to notice a face outside one of the windows, and it did not take him more than the thousandth part of a second to recognize the Deacon looking straight at him. It was a tremendous moment, and Seph could almost feel the wool on the top of his head uncurl and rise right up under his hat.
His first impulse was to make a rush for the door. When he crossed the entry door-sill, however, he stubbed one foot, and fell, and the Deacon's hand was on him before he could recover himself.
He led Seph down the road, Mrs. Potter following close behind and pleading for mercy, as mothers do.
But in a moment the mask fell off, and the Deacon, amazed, let go his hold.
"What—!"
Seph did not wait to hear anything more, but ran into the bushes, then leaped over a fence, and ran at his best speed across an acre or two of ploughed ground.
"By golly!" he gasped, dropping down at last exhausted. "I reckon I's glad I'm black dis yere time, anyhow!"
Sorely disappointed, however, he skulked back to the barn, and there another misfortune overtook him—his own clothes had disappeared.
For a moment or two this startling discovery was too much for his intellect to grasp. He searched here and there desperately, overturned the hay, upset a barrel of oats, frightened the hens from their roosts, and got the horse to neighing. Then, scared and bewildered, he rushed outside, undecided what to do.
Surprise, however, awaited him here again. In a moment he saw himself—or at least somebody, with a black face and his clothes on—steal out from the wood-shed near by, and hurry down to the road.
If he wasn't himself, who in de world was he? dat's what he'd like to know.
But in about three minutes, when he saw the mysterious personage and the Deacon meet unexpectedly near a great tree that stood in the yard, he was never so glad in his life to be in some other fellow's clothes.
Seph ran over to the wood-shed, climbed up the ladder to the chamber above, and began to disrobe himself of Job's clothes in a hurry. He had got them all off, when the personage came scrambling up the ladder also, and the two confronted each other in the straggling moonbeams that found their way through a cobwebbed window.
"What yer gwine to do wid my clothes on, Job Potter?" Seph asked, wrathfully.
"Nothin'. Pa's spoilt it all! He fust thought that you was me, and then that I was you. There's no goin' to the party, anyway."
Seph dropped down on the floor, and let out the laugh that had been tickling him several times during the evening.
"It am all on account ob de Deacon bein' so onreasonable," he said. "We's had a perdicament for sartin."
