"How should I know, being a perfect stranger to everybody around you?"
"Ah! true. But you've seen him; and heard us talk of him. Nat Bradley."
"Nat Bradley! He here? I thought he said he was going down the river."
"He did; but for all that he's here again."
"For what purpose?" I asked, inspired by an unpleasant thought.
"Heaven only knows. He didn't seem too well pleased at seeing me. I suppose he fancied I might think it strange, after his telling us he was off for Mississippi. He explained, by saying, there was no boat at Nashville ready to start. Now that I know not to be true; for I've heard elsewhere that there was one went down about ten days ago—just in time for him to have gone by her. He's a queer fellow; and it's hard to say what he's dodging about here for. He told me he was on the way to a nigger trader's near the Tennessee shoals, who'd got some hands to sell, and as he'd heard they could be had cheap, he was going to buy some of them. From there he intended riding across to Memphis, and taking boat for below. He must be making money, somehow, as he talked of buying no less than twenty of the trader's lot."
While listening to this long explanation, I imagined I had obtained a cue as to the voice I had heard in conversation with Bill Black, the boatman. It was the same that had jarred so disagreeably on my ear, while pronouncing the name "Corneel."
I stated my suspicion to the young planter.
"Like enough," was his reply, "though I didn't know he was acquainted with Black, nor can I see what difference it should make to him about our having a large crop, or how we get it to market."
Neither could I; and it was just this that continued to mystify me, long after we had ceased to converse on the subject.