We separated at the mounting-block, and I watched them a little way down the road. And felt a little touch of envy. Evelyn was looking very alluring that afternoon.
I rode in the opposite direction until I came to the big open flat north of the racetrack; there, a long way off, I saw John Fulton and Lucy walking slowly side by side. John was sabering dead weed stalks with his stick. So I turned east to avoid them, then north, until I had passed the forlorn yellow pesthouse with its high, deer-park fence, and was well out in the country.
Then I left the main road, and followed one tortuous sandy track after another. Suddenly Heroine shied. I looked up from a deep, aimless reverie, and saw sitting at the side of a trail a withered old negress. She looked like a monkey buried in a mound of rags.
"Evening, Auntie," I said.
"Evening, boss."
Heroine had broken into a sweat, and was trembling. She kept her eyes on the old negress and her ears pointed at her, her nostrils widely dilated.
"My horse thinks you're a witch, Auntie," I said. "Hope you'll excuse her."
"I allows I got ter, boss, caze that's jes what I is."
"Honest to Gospel?" I laughed.
"You got fifty cents, boss?"