About noon a gaudily-dressed and rough-looking man rode up to the gate, and alighted from a fine bay horse. With that free and easy sort of way so peculiar to a certain class of mankind, he walked up the avenue to the front door.
"Gal," he said, addressing me, "whar's yer master?"
"In the house. Will you walk in?"
"No, it is skersely worth while; jist tell him that me, Bill Tompkins, wants to see him; but stay," he added, as I was turning to seek my master, "is you the gal he sold to me yesterday?"
"I don't know, sir."
"Wal, you is devilish likely. Put out yer foot. Wal, it is nice enuff to belong to a white 'ooman. You is a bright-colored mulatto. I must have you."
"Heavens! I hope not," was my half-uttered expression, as I turned away, for I had caught the meaning of that lascivious eye, and shrank from the threatened danger. Though I had been cruelly treated, yet had I been allowed to retain my person inviolate; and I would rather, a thousand-fold, have endured the brutality of Mr. Peterkin, than those loathsome looks which I felt betokened ruin.
"Master, a man, calling himself Bill Tompkins, wishes to see you," said I, as I entered his private apartment.
"Can't yer say Mr. Tompkins?"
"He told me to tell you Bill Tompkins; I only repeat his words."