"I can't hab nuffin' happen to de fambly, Major. You know our folks is quality, an' always was, an' I dassent look my mistress in de face if anythin' teches Marsa George." Then bending down he said in a hoarse whisper: "See dat old clock out dar wid his eye wide open? Know what's down below dat in de cellar? De jail!" And two tears rolled down his cheeks.
* * * * *
It was some time before I could quiet the old man's anxieties and coax him back into his usual good humor, and then only when I began to ask him of the old plantation days.
Then he fell to talking about the colonel's father, General John Carter, and the high days at Carter Hall when Miss Nancy was a young lady and the colonel a boy home from the university.
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"Dem was high times. We ain't neber seed no time like dat since de war. Git up in de mawnin' an' look out ober de lawn, an' yer come fo'teen or fifteen couples ob de fustest quality folks, all on horseback ridin' in de gate. Den such a scufflin' round! Old marsa an' missis out on de po'ch, an' de little pickaninnies runnin' from de quarters, an' all hands helpin' 'em off de horses, an' dey all smokin' hot wid de gallop up de lane.
"An' den sich a breakfast an' sich dancin' an' co'tin': ladies all out on de lawn in der white dresses, an' de gemmen in fair-top boots, an' Mammy Jane runnin' round same as a chicken wid its head off,—an' der heads was off befo' dey knowed it, an' dey a-br'ilin' on de gridiron.
"Dat would go on a week or mo', an' den up dey'll all git an' away dey'd go to de nex' plantation, an' take Miss Nancy along wid 'em on her little sorrel mare, an' I on Marsa John's black horse, to take care bofe of 'em. Dem was times!
"My old marsa,"—and his eyes glistened,—"my old Marsa John was a gem-man, sah, like dey don't see nowadays. Tall, sah, an' straight as a cornstalk; hair white an' silky as de tassel; an' a voice like de birds was singin', it was dat sweet.
"'Chad,' he use' ter say,—you know I was young den, an' I was his body servant,—'Chad, come yer till I bre'k yo' head;' an' den when I come he'd laugh fit to kill hisself. Dat's when you do right. But when you was a low-down nigger an' got de debbil in yer, an' ole marsa hear it an' send de oberseer to de quarters for you to come to de little room in de big house whar de walls was all books an' whar his desk was, 't wa'n't no birds about his voice den,—mo' like de thunder."