“I’m just from Cornstalk, Texas, on mu way to Grant. An’ them roads as I’ve traversed isn’t what I’d call the best in a fair and square talk.”
His manner bore not the slightest mark of deference. He spoke to Thérèse as he might have spoken to one of her black servants, or as he would have addressed a princess of royal blood if fate had ever brought him into such unlikely contact, so clearly was the sense of human equality native to him.
Thérèse knew her animal, and waited patiently for his business to unfold itself.
“I reckon thar hain’t no ford hereabouts?” he asked, looking at her with a certain challenge.
“Oh, no; its even difficult crossing in the flat,” she answered.
“Wall, I hed calc’lated continooing on this near side. Reckon I could make it?” challenging her again to an answer.
“There’s no road on this side,” she said, turning away to fasten more securely the escaped branches of a rose-bush that twined about a column near which she stood.
Whether there were a road on this side or on the other side, or no road at all, appeared to be matter of equal indifference to Mr. Jimson, so far as his manner showed. He continued imperturbably “I ’lowed to stop here on a little matter o’ business. ’Tis some out o’ mu way; more’n I’d calc’lated. You couldn’t tell the ixact distance from here to Colfax, could you?”
Thérèse rather impatiently gave him the desired information, and begged that he would disclose his business with her.
“Wall,” he said, “onpleasant news ’ll keep most times tell you’re ready fur it. Thet’s my way o’ lookin’ at it.”