I
“ALL DE WORL’ AM SAD AN’ DREARY.”
Mustard Prophet, overseer of the Nigger-Heel plantation, sat on a box under a horse-shed in the rear of the Gaitskill store.
The gathering dusk of the October evening lent beauty to his sordid surroundings, and Mustard sweetened the scene by music. His thick lips caressed the silver mouthpiece of a cornet, and his bellows-like lungs sent forth strains which made all Tickfall listen:
“All de worl’ am sad an’ dreary, eb’rywhar I roam—”
Wherever music is there the negroes are gathered together. In a moment Pap Curtain entered the lot.
He was welcome because he carried a trombone.
“How come you toot sich sad toons, Mustard?” Pap inquired as he took his own musical instrument out of a dirty green bag.
“Ain’t us all sons of sorrer, Pap?” Mustard demanded in an argumentative tone. “Fo’ hundred bales of cotton raised on de Nigger-Heel plantation by me—an’ how much does me an’ Marse Tom git fer it? Jes’ perzackly nothin’ an’ not no more.”
“De white folks is argufyin’ ’bout a buy-a-bale move,” Pap began.
“Huh,” Mustard snorted. “Me an’ Marse Tom is argufyin’ ’bout a sell-a-bale move. I come to town to cornverse him ’bout dat.”