Dr. Norfleet was tall, and his pants legs were long, so she conceived the idea of packing her donations in the legs of those he had given her. She sewed up the legs at the bottom, put a stout loop on the back of the binding at the top, and hung her improvised receptacle on a hook behind the office door; everything that was given to her, she dropped it down the pants legs—sugar, coffee, second-hand clothes, chunks of meet, etc., all in a jumble.
When they were well nigh full, she began to wish for Mr. Hawkins. He came at last, and she led him to look behind the door.
He was delighted, and scarcely taking time to rest from his journey of six miles on a warm day, he placed the well stuffed pants astride his neck, and struck out up the Nashville road, without even bidding Dr. Norfleet’s family good bye.
Fronie followed close at his heels, holding by the legs, in her right hand, a fine fat pair of Muscovy ducks, Mrs. Norfleet had given her. On passing Mr. William Brown’s residence, just up the road, Mr. Brown’s son, Robert, happened to be at the front gate; young Robert Bourne had a keen sense of humor, and their ludicrous appearance threw him into such a fit of laughter that he rolled over and over on the ground.
But the Hawkins’s kept straight ahead, bound for Turnersville before sunset, but they were doomed to an unexpected delay.
The ducks grew heavy, and Fronie set them down by the roadside to rest her tired arm.
It happened that she stopped at the head of the ten-foot deep gully, just beyond the old Mallory homestead, where the old Harmony Church road branched off to the right from the main Nashville route. The ducks set to fluttering, and tumbled down the embankment and into the gully, breaking the string that held them together. Ed flew into a rage, because she let them get away, and swore he’d whip her on the spot, if she did not catch them. She chased them up and down the gully till she was almost exhausted, when a passing fishing party came to her assistance.
The late George Washington’s family contributed liberally to the support of this couple, and in speaking of the Washington home, Fronie always referred to it as “the fat house,” meaning rich people.
The young people of Port Royal neighborhood, spent many pleasant times in years gone by, masquerading in comic costumes, as Ed and Fronie Hawkins.
They were known far and wide, as a very amusing couple, but when old age came to them, and the liberal friends who had kept “the wolf from their cabin door” had passed away, it became necessary for them to be carried to the county poor house, and from there, I’m sure, their innocent souls went straight to heaven.