"You're looking mighty well, anyhow. What has been the trouble to-day?"
"Why, I'll tell you," responded Mr. Sanders, with a show of animation. "I've been gwine round all day tryin' to git up subscriptions for to build a flatform for Gus Tidwell. Gus needs a place whar he can stand an' explutterate on the Constitution all day, and not be in nobody's way."
"Well, of course you succeeded," remarked Mr. Tidwell, good-naturedly.
"Middlin' well—middlin' well. A coloured lady flung a dime in the box, an' I put in a quarter. In all, I reckon I've raised a dollar an' a half. But I reely believe I could 'a' raised a hunderd dollars ef I'd 'a' told 'em whar the flatform was to be built."
"Where is that?" some one inquired.
"In the pine-thicket behind the graveyard," responded Mr. Sanders, so earnestly and promptly that the crowd shouted with laughter. Even Mr. Tidwell, who was "case-hardened," as Mrs. Absalom would say, to Mr. Sanders's jokes, joined in with the rest.
"Gus is a purty good lawyer," said Mr. Sanders, lifting his voice a little to make sure that Silas Tomlin would hear every syllable of what he intended to say; "but he'll never be at his best till he finds out that the Constitution, like the Bible, can be translated to suit the idees of any party or any crank. But I allers brag on Gus because I believe in paternizin' home industries. Howsomever, between us boys an' gals, an' not aimin' for it to go any furder, there's a lawyer in town to-day—an' maybe he'll be here to-morrow—who knows more about the law in one minnit than Gus could tell you in a day and a half. An' when it comes to explutterations on p'ints of constitutional law, Gus wouldn't be in it."
"Is that so? What is the gentleman's name?" asked Mr. Tidwell.
"Judge Albert Vardeman," replied Mr. Sanders. "Now, when you come to talk about lawyers, you'll be doin' yourself injustice ef you leave out the name of Albert Vardeman. He ain't got much of a figure—he's shaped somethin' like a gourdful of water—but I tell you he's got a head on him."
"Is the Judge really here?" Mr. Tidwell asked. "I'd like very much to have a talk with him."