"How does she do it?"
"Oh, she puts her bucket down and gives old Spot a slap wiv her hand and says, 'stan' over!'—an—d—then she stoops down and—groans—and says, 'Oh—h, my Lord!'—and then—"
"Well?"
"Then she thes pulls the triggers."
Mammy Cely, coming at that moment to take Philip to bed, stopped short in the doorway. She had not heard her Marse Richard laugh like that for many a long year.
Richard found himself smiling over his paper when they were gone. The child said such unexpected things. He recalled the beach scene too. Philip had made it stand out vividly. He hardly thought he could take Mr. Harcourt's place.
In about an hour Mammy Cely returned. Philip was restless and would be satisfied with nothing but his Uncle Richard.
"He 'low he wants to say his prayers to you."
"His prayers?" repeated Mr. De Jarnette in perplexity—there were always some new developments about this child—"what does he want to say his prayers to me for? This is incipient Catholicism."
"Marse Richard, a chile always has to say his prayers to some person. He don't know nothin' 'bout sayin' 'em to God. God done put the mother of a chile in His place—He knows how chil'n is. And when the mother is tuk away—"