"That sho?" the Deputy nods sleepily.
The negro comes running up with a paper of scrap in one hand, a plug in the other. The Deputy slowly opens his eyes. He walks unsteadily to the cell, remains there a few minutes, and returns with both hands fumbling at his hip pocket. He spits viciously at the sink, sits down, fills his mouth with tobacco, glances at the floor, and demands, hoarsely:
"Where's all them spittoons, eh, you men?"
"Just being cleaned, Mr. Greaves," Woods replies.
"Cleaned, always th' shame shtory. I ordered—ya—ordered—hey, bring shpittoon, Jasper." He wags his head drowsily.
"He means he ordered spittoons by the wagonload," Hopkins says, with a wink at Woods. "It was the very first order he gave when he became Deputy after Jimmie McPane died. I tell you, Scot, we won't see soon another Deputy like old Jimmie. He was Deputy all right, every inch of him. Wouldn't stand for the old man, the Warden, interfering with him, either. Not like this here," he points contemptuously at the snoring Greaves. "Here, Benny," he raises his voice and slaps the deputy on the knee, "here's Jasper with your spittoon."
Greaves wakes with a start, and gazes stupidly about; presently, noticing the trusty with the large cuspidor, and spurts a long jet at it.
"Say, Jasper," Hopkins calls to the retiring negro, "the deputy wants to hear that story you told us a while ago, about you got the left hind foot of a she-rabbit, on a moonlit night in a graveyard."
"Who shaid I want to hear 't?" the Deputy bristles, suddenly wide awake.
"Yes, you do, Greaves," Hopkins asserts. "The rabbit foot brings good luck, you know. This coon here wears it on his neck. Show it to the Deputy, Jasper."