Dust was guyed good-naturedly by the occupants of the platform, as he went into the store to get some fine cut.
“What’s that you’ve got out there between them buggy thills, Doc?” queried Hyatt.
Bill winked at me and asked him if he had driven by his garden lately—a delicate reference to the cemetery, intended to be sarcastic.
Another stove pipe hat was brought by “Pop” Wilkins, an octogenarian. He also wore it jammed well down behind his ears. The old man climbed painfully up the steps with his hickory cane, and dropped into a chair that Hyatt brought out of the store for him. He placed the ancient tile under it, mopped his bald head with a large red bandanna, and looked wistfully beyond the river.
Pop had been afflicted with intermittent ague for several years. He was once a preacher and a temperance advocate. He was placed on the superannuated list by the Methodist conference, and had finally been expunged as a backslider. He fell from grace and yielded to the lure of strong waters. Once, after he had over indulged for several weeks, he went and sat in sad reflection on the bank of the gloomy river at night. Out of its depths came strange six footed beasts and multicolored crawling things that terrified Pop and drove remorse into his soul. Since that eventful night he had been more moderate, but he was still in danger, and it was a question as to whether old age, ague, or J. Barleycorn would get him first.
My friend “Kun’l” Peets, who was a comparatively recent importation into the river country, came over the bridge with a basket on his arm containing a couple of setter pups that he wanted Posey to see, with a view of possibly having them applied on his account at the store. He was an ex-confederate from Tennessee, and seemed sadly out of harmony with his surroundings. The pups were liberated on the platform and subjected to much poking about and criticism by the experts. The Colonel considered them “fine specimens of a noble strain,” but Wirrick thought “they looked like they had some wolf blood in ’em.” Posey agreed to accept the little animals in lieu of eight dollars owed by the Colonel, with the understanding that they were to be kept for him until they were a month older. Everybody understood his kindly consideration for the old man, and knew that he had no earthly use for the pups.
The assemblage in front of the store became more varied and interesting with the arrival of other visitors. The chairs were exhausted and the platform edge was entirely occupied. Bill Stiles had just commenced the narration of a horse trade story, when an old man appeared in the twilight on the bridge. He wore a long gray overcoat, although the evening was very warm. The story stopped and interest was centered on the slowly approaching figure.
I asked Posey who he was. He bent his head toward me confidentially, and, in something between a low whistle and a whisper, replied: “S-s-s-s-t——‘the Serpent’s Hiss’!!!”
We were in prohibition territory, and the old “bootlegger” was bringing twelve flat pint bottles in twelve inside pockets of the gray overcoat to break the drought at Posey’s store.
He was an unbonded warehouse, and the reason for the mysterious gathering on that particular evening was now apparent.