Aunt Ailsey took up a corncob pipe from the stones and fell to smoking. She sank at once into a senile reverie, muttering beneath her breath with short, meaningless grunts. Warm as the summer evening was, she shivered before the glowing logs.
For a time the child sat patiently watching the embers; then she leaned forward and touched the old woman's knee. “Aunt Ailsey, O Aunt Ailsey!”
Aunt Ailsey stirred wearily and crossed her swollen feet upon the hearth.
“Dar ain' nuttin' but a hoot owl dat'll sass you ter yo' face,” she muttered, and, as she drew her pipe from her mouth, the gray smoke circled about her head.
The child edged nearer. “I want to speak to you, Aunt Ailsey,” she said. She seized the withered hand and held it close in her own rosy ones. “I want you—O Aunt Ailsey, listen! I want you to conjure my hair coal black.”
She finished with a gasp, and with parted lips sat waiting. “Coal black, Aunt Ailsey!” she cried again.
A sudden excitement awoke in the old woman's face; her hands shook and she leaned nearer. “Hi! who dat done tole you I could conjure, honey?” she demanded.
“Oh, you can, I know you can. You conjured back Sukey's lover from Eliza Lou, and you conjured all the pains out of Uncle Shadrach's leg.” She fell on her knees and laid her head in the old woman's lap. “Conjure quick and I won't holler,” she said.
“Gawd in heaven!” exclaimed Aunt Ailsey. Her dim old eyes brightened as she gently stroked the child's brow with her palsied fingers. “Dis yer ain' no way ter conjure, honey,” she whispered. “You des wait twel de full er de moon, w'en de devil walks de big road.” She was wandering again after the fancies of dotage, but Betty threw herself upon her. “Oh, change it! change it!” cried the child. “Beg the devil to come and change it quick.”
Brought back to herself, Aunt Ailsey grunted and knocked the ashes from her pipe. “I ain' gwine ter ax no favors er de devil,” she replied sternly. “You des let de devil alont en he'll let you alont. I'se done been young, en I'se now ole, en I ain' never seed de devil stick his mouf in anybody's bizness 'fo' he's axed.”