The gin stopped its whir, and the clerk weighed the cotton. Religion watched him sharply, and counted the checks he handed her twice.
"If you pass 'em at the Hermitage," he said, "tell 'em to give you another five-cent check; I'm short to-night."
"I ain't goin' to the Hermitage store; I'm goin' to the ferry. They give me cash there for the checks."
"What do they take off?"
"They takes one cent out'n every five. But I'm 'bliged to have the hard money. We has to pay for a good many things we git for Min in hard money." She had taken up the empty bags, but still waited. "I wish you'd please, sir, see if you 'ain't got another check nowhere."
"You're a sight, Religion," he said, good-naturedly. "Here's a nickel."
With her bags on her arm she went out across the dry grass to where a little black mule, not much larger than a goat, was standing. Beck greeted her with a bray astonishing for one of her size, and a switch with her rope of a tail. Unheeding the cheerful greeting, Religion gave all her attention to untying the halter, and soon they were going along the sandy road straight through the woods.
The rickety box-wagon and the chain traces rattled noisily. Religion cracked her whip—it was a stick with a plaited leather string on the end. Beck was in
a hurry to get home, and the wagon bumped along over roots and stumps until it was a wonder how Religion kept herself on the board which served for a seat. All the swamps and woods in Sawny were in bad repute. There was an old cemetery, rambling over many acres, lost in ivy and briers and immense trees, but abundant in ghost stories. There was the swamp through which Sherman's soldiers had cut a road, and near by was the hill-side where many sunken hollows marked their graves. A "spirit" could be raised there at a thought's notice. Beck flew past these unpleasant places, and her little hoofs were clattering over the loose bridge at the foot of the hill, where, the cemetery ending, the plantation road began, when she backed suddenly—so suddenly that the board tipped up and dropped Religion into the bottom of the wagon.