"Who's the nigger?"
"Cornelius Leggett." John's hand crept, trembling, to his hip pocket.
His companion grasped it. "Pshaw, March, are you crazy?"
"No, are you? I'm not going to shoot; I was only thinking how easy I could do it."
He stepped nearer the entrance. The lone keeper had followed the two men into a curtained stall. His back was just in sight.
"Let's slip in and hear what they say," murmured John, visibly disturbed. But when his companion assented he drew back. His fellow scanned him with a smile of light contempt. There were beads of moisture on his brow. Just then the keeper went briskly toward his kitchen, and the two youths glided into the stall next to the one occupied.
"Yass, seh," Cornelius was tipsily remarking, "the journals o' the day reputes me to have absawb some paucity o' the school funds. Well, supposen I has; I say, jess supposen it, you know. I antagonize you this question: did Napoleon Bonapawt never absawb any paucity o' otheh folks' things? An' yit he was the greates' o' the great. He's my patte'n, seh. He neveh stole jiss to be a-stealin'! An' yit wheneveh he found it assential of his destiny to steal anything, he stole it!
"O' co'se he incurred and contracted enemies; I has mine; it's useless to translate it. My own motheh's husban'—you riccolec' ole Unc' 'Viticus, don't you?—Rev'en' Leviticus Wisdom—on'y niggeh that eveh refused a office!"—he giggled—"Well, he ensued to tu'n me out'n the church. Yass, seh, faw nothin' but fallin' in love with his daughteh—my step-sisteh—sayin' I run her out'n the county!
"But he couldn't p'ocure a sufficient concawdence o' my fellow-citizens; much less o' they wives—naw evm o' mine! No, seh! They brought in they verdic' that jess at this junction it'd be cal'lated to ungendeh strife an' could on'y do hahm." He giggled again.
"My politics save me, seh! They always will. An' they ought to; faw they as pyo as the crystial fountain."