The Bishop and the Boogerman

by Joel Chandler Harris

This simple question developed into a long conversation, with the result that Randall was as enthusiastic about Miss Betty's boy as he was about Miss Betty, who had saved his life. "He sho' have got the blood in 'im. He don't look strong, like all de balance of the Bowdens, but he's got their ways. He walks an' holds his head jest like Miss Betty."

When Adelaide opened the door, and saw standing there the young man at whom she had aimed her cornstalk gun, she was surprised to find that she was not at all embarrassed. She had no idea that this particular meeting had been arranged and provided for long ages ago. But she wondered why she should feel so cool and collected, when she should be confused and blushing. This is the way young women act in story books, and Adelaide had often longed for the opportunity to stammer and blush when a strange but noble young man appeared before her; but now that the young man had come, she felt as if she had known him a long, long time. He was the embarrassed one, while she observed that he had nice brown eyes, to light up his handsome countenance, and these brown eyes seemed to be trying to apologise for something or other; and all the time the young man was thinking that he had never seen such beautiful blue eyes as those that were shyly glancing at him from under their long lashes. It was a desperate moment for all concerned, but Providence was there, and laid its calm, cool hand on the situation. The young man asked for Mr. Whipple, but Providence had been before him, and Mr. Whipple was not to be found in the house, though Adelaide tried hard to find him, not knowing that if her uncle could have been found just at that particular time, a great many possibilities would have been destroyed. Adelaide inquired if the brown eyes wouldn't come in and wait for Uncle Jonas, who was to be expected at any moment, and the brown eyes softly admitted that nothing would please them better if such an arrangement were perfectly agreeable to everybody, otherwise not for the world would they intrude—and then, as a matter of course, the blue eyes were compelled to see to it that the time of waiting would be made perfectly pleasant.

After awhile the sound of footsteps was heard on the veranda, and Adelaide, with a secret regret, declared that Uncle Jonas must be coming. But Providence was looking out for the interests of the young fellow with a keener eye, for the footsteps they heard were those of Mr. Sanders. He came in without knocking, as usual, and Adelaide ran to meet him, just as she always did. "You look as flustrated as ef you had man company," Mr. Sanders remarked, as she greeted him. She slapped him lightly on the arm by way of warning and rebuke. "An' I'll lay I kin guess his name: it's Winters." Adelaide was very red in the face as she shook her head. "Then it's Somers," he declared; "I know'd it was one of the seasons that had dropped in on you out'n season. But it happens to be the very chap I'm arter." He stalked in to the sitting-room, and shook hands with young Somers, calling him Jonah, though his name was John.

Then he casually inquired as to the whereabouts of Mr. Jonas Whipple, in spite of the fact that he already knew. "You see how it is," he remarked to the young man; "you thought you wanted to see Jonas, but it wasn't Jonas you wanted to see at all." Mr. Sanders pursed his mouth, and stared at the ceiling. The remark he had made was interpreted by Adelaide in a way he had not intended, but she was quite equal to the emergency.

"Well, Mr. Sanders," she inquired with great dignity, "whom did Mr. Somers desire to see?"

He turned a bland and child-like smile upon her. "Why, he wanted to see me, of course. Who else could it 'a' been?" Adelaide's dignity was not made of the strongest stuff, and she was compelled to laugh. "I understood him to inquire for Uncle Jonas," she said simply, "but I may have been mistaken."

"No; I really want to see Mr. Whipple," the young man insisted. "That is my business here."

Mr. Sanders beamed upon him with a smile that was as broad and sweet as a slice of pie. "I've allers took notice," he remarked, "that wimmen an' children, an' young folks in gener'l, will ax for the identical things they ought not to have. They're made that-a-way, I reckon."

In a little while the young man bowed himself out, followed by Mr. Sanders. "You young fellers worry me no little," remarked the Sage of Shady Dale, as they went along the street together. "I happen to know about the business that fetched you here, an' I mighty nigh swallered my goozle when I seed you makin' for Jonas's."

"Well, I really thought Mr. Whipple was the proper person to see. I was told that he held the key to the situation," young Somers replied.