“He, he! Didn’t I say ‘smartest little wife’? Reckon I kin do dat are. Reckon I’ll p’rade on de fo’th, an’ yo’ll wait till Sunday.”
Two of his neighbors presently joined Mr. Pipsie, with whom he was soon discussing the anticipated celebration, which was quite a novelty in the locality. Suddenly a loud sound of wheels was heard.
“Hello!” cried Dan, springing from his seat. “Heah comes my friend Bakah! Hello, Babe! Bett’ take car, dat team, else yo’ git toated clean off, an gone to smash ’fo’ yo’ muddah knows nuffin ’bout it. Reckon yo’ didn’t ax her mout yo’ gwout alone?”
The sound of the jolting wagon rendered this speech inaudible to the youthful driver, who was passing without a “Howdy!” (an offense in that locality) but the loud, derisive “guffaw” of the three colored men, which followed Dan’s sally, did not fail to reach him, and he paused suddenly, just past the door.
He was tall and large, but unusually boyish for a youth of twenty years. In an angry tone he shouted:
“Dan Pipsie, come out here! I want to see yer.”
That individual made his way, quite deliberately, to the side of the vehicle, and with a strange mixture of timidity and bravado in his manner.
“What do you mean by cursing me in that way? I ha’n’t done nothing to you,” said the boy.
“Oh, laws! I’s jest in fun, an’ I’s shor’ yo’ didn’t heah yo’r name mixin’ up in it. A man’s a right to talk or cuss on his own do’,” (door) “an’ nothin’ to no man no’ his boy gwoine ’long de road.”