“You’re the voodoo?”

“Yassuh.”

“You can quiet the Ghost of Alligator Swamp?”

“Yassuh.”

“How do you know you can?”

“Ah has done it befo’, sah—when folks done pay me well ernuff fo’ it,” grinned Uncle Tobey, cunningly.

“Well, we haven’t minded the ghost so much,” went on Henry Tremaine. “But last night your ghost took away one of our brightest young men.”

“Yassuh. Ah know,” admitted Uncle Tobey. “Ole Unc Tobe done know ebberyt’ing w’ut done happen, sah.”

“How did you know it?” demanded Tremaine, with unwonted sharpness.

“W’y sah, all de birds ob de air done tote news to ole Unc Tobe,” asserted the aged negro, solemnly.