CHAPTER IV
WE PICK UP THE TRAIL
In the morning all but Rufe went to shore. Rufe would have none of it.
"Say," he said, when Ray offered to remain aboard in his place, "say, you-all, you ain't guine git dis niggah in dat town to be voodooed by dem heathen niggahs. Hum-n! An' I ain't got no rabbit-fut, nor nuthing."
Julian, Ray, and Norris went sight-seeing, while Marat, Robert, and I made our way to the apothecary shop.
Jules Sevier greeted us.
"I ver' sorry I have no news for you," he said. "There is one, I could not find, who have a son who carry the mail, and know ver' much of thees country. Maybe tomorrow she weel be home, and we can learn sometheeng."
He ushered us into the shop, where there awaited us a black woman of middle age, who, Sevier said, would tell us a tale that we would travel far to find a match for. She could speak only in the French; so Jean Marat got her tale, which he interpreted for Robert and myself.
Her husband had been a voodoo devotee; but twelve years ago he had been induced to renounce the worship, and turn to one of the Christian denominations. One of his old associates contrived to introduce into his food one of the poisons so well known to the voodoo.
The man died.