Popsy Spout hesitated a minute, scratched his snow-white hair, and looked at the neat piles of money with an air of perplexity.
“Isn’t that correct?” Gaitskill asked.
“Yes, suh, dat’s c’reck,” Popsy said uncertainly. “Dat’s de same number I got when I counted it, but somepin is powerful strange ’bout dat money.”
“What’s the trouble?” Gaitskill asked.
“You counted it so quick, Marse Tommy!”
“Well—I counted it right, didn’t I?”
“Yes, suh, but—I reckin’ it’s all right, Marse Tommy. But, you see, it tuck me five whole days to count dat money an’ it wus de hardest wuck I ever done—I sweated barrels of sweat! It ’peared like a whole big pile, when I counted it. But ef I spends it as quick as you counted it, ’twon’t las’ me till I kin walk outen dis here bank!”
“I understand,” Gaitskill smiled. “But you don’t want to spend this money. How long did it take you to accumulate it?”
“Fawty year,” Popsy told him. “Bad times comes frequent to a nigger, an’ I wanted to save a leetle ahead.”
“The idea is to take as long spending it as you did accumulating it,” Gaitskill said. “In that case, it will last you until you have passed one hundred.”