With the first forward step of the mob a tall, gangling, half-wit boy, with a long neck, a step-ladder head, a long sharp nose, and a receding chin, and a loose-lipped mouth which dribbled tobacco-juice as he spoke, began to repeat like a chant:
“Gon’er git them niggers! Gon’er git them niggers! Gon’er git them niggers!”
His harsh, crackly, gosling voice, uttering every word with a jerk, soon took the monotonous roll of a snaredrum. Unconsciously the men kept step to the words and the purpose expressed in the sentence was burned into the very fiber of their souls:
“Gon’er git them niggers! Gon’er git them niggers! Gon’er git them niggers!”
Turning into the street which led to the jail two blocks away, the mob rounded the Confederate Circle, in the center of which was a ridiculous, stump-legged, pewter image of a man, too short in its stride for glory, but, nevertheless, erected by a grateful populace as a monument of glory to commemorate the heroes of the South.
Then Sheriff Ulloa stepped out of the jail, locked the door behind him, tossed the key as far as he could throw it into some high weeds growing at the side of the prison, and waited.
It was not necessary for the leader and spokesman to explain to the officer of the law the purpose of their visit.
Fully a block away the half-wit’s strident voice, having gained in volume by the constant repetition of the phrase, conveyed the message in tones which crackled like thorns under a pot:
“Gon’er git them niggers! Gon’er git them niggers! Gon’er git——”
The mob halted.