He glanced up at her quizzically.
"Whut do you s'pose the young man is goin' to have to say about that?" he asked.
"If he doesn't like it he can find some other girl to marry him," she said.
"Oh, I kind of imagine he'll listen to reason—especially comin' frum you," said Judge Priest. "He will ef he's the kind of young man that's worthy to marry Tom Dabney's daughter."
It is possible that some of the bridegroom's kinspeople, coming down from the North for the wedding, were shocked to find a wizen, coal-black woman, who was lame of one leg, not only taking part in the ceremony, filling a place next in importance to that of the contracting pair and the maid of honour, but apparently in active and undisputed charge of the principal details. However, being well-bred persons, they did not betray their astonishment by word, look or deed. Perhaps they figured it as one of the customs of the country that an old shrill-voiced negress, smelling of snuff and black silk, should play so prominent a rôle in the event itself and in the reception that followed.
However, all that is ancient history now. What I have to add is a commingling of past local history and present local history. As I said at the outset, there were formerly any number of black children in our town who bore the names of white friends and white patrons, but to my knowledge there was never but one white child named for a black person. The child thus distinguished was a girl child, the first-born of Mr. and Mrs. Harvey Winslow. Her full name was Charlotte Helm Winslow, but nearly everybody called her Little Sharley. She is still called so, I believe, though growing now into quite a sizable young person.