“Good Lo’d! I dun always been here,” and, as if to emphasize the statement, his old face wrinkled more than usual.
“Do you remember the pigeons, years ago?” I asked.
“I shore does, sah.”
“What became of them?” I asked, recalling the dream.
“Whar you all come from to ast dis nigger such fool things! Of cou’se I knows.”
“Well, I don’t,” I remarked; “but would like to very much.”
“You never dun heard of de black fog and the ‘norther’ on dis beach ’bout twenty-five years ago?”
“I never have; but what has that to do with it?”
“Beg your pa’don, sah, I guess you-all ain’t jokin’?”
I assured him I was not, and he began the story of the disappearance of the pigeons something like this: