Old Isaiah Gaitskill, superintendent of the Gaitskill hog-camp, ran down the aisle, clawing at the white wool which fitted his head like a rubber cap. His face was ashy with the dust of the high-way, and tears had streaked it where they had ran downward through the dust.
“My Gawd, cullud folks!” he wailed. “De white folks is done kotched Hitch Diamond—dey are fotchin’ him to jail right now! Here dey come down de big road. Oh, my Gawd!”
The old negro turned and fell with his hands clasping the altar, sobbing like a child.
X
HOME AGAIN.
The entire congregation ran out of the building into the churchyard and looked up the street. To the end of their lives they never forgot what they saw.
Hitch Diamond, bareheaded, barefooted, dressed in a red undershirt and a pair of blue overalls, was walking down the middle of the street, his hands manacled behind him, his head hanging in shame.
Dust covered him from head to feet, and perspiration streamed down his face. He had tried to wipe the perspiration away by rubbing his head upon his broad shoulders, and this had smeared his face with mud until he was a horrible creature to behold.
Hitch looked old, he looked sick. All of the pride and jauntiness which had characterized him when he left Tickfall for the prize-fight had dropped away, and he was merely the shell of the man who had gone away from home to certain pugilistic victory.
On either side of Hitch Diamond rode a strange white man—New Orleans detectives employed by the mill owners of Sawtown to track the fugitive down. Behind the three rode the sheriff of Tickfall Parish, Mr. John Flournoy.
Dainty Blackum ran back into the church and brought from the pulpit a glass pitcher with a broken spout. She met Hitch and the officers right in front of the church, and the officers called a halt as she held the pitcher up to Hitch Diamond’s thirsty lips. Then, dipping a handkerchief into the water, she wiped the mud and sweat from the tortured man’s face.