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"Ah—Ah jess come tuh—tuh see, Mas' Abnah! You won' kill me fuh—fuh dat, Mas' Abnah! Ah allus toted up yo' watah, Mas' Abnah. Ah—ah—"

"No!" cried Ditmas sharply, "of course we aren't going to do anything to you. You have a perfect right to come out and look—what are you afraid of?"

"Wuh—well, Mas' Ditmas, when de white fo'ks k-k-kill one pusson d-dey usually k-k-kill all de niggahs dey can fin' too."

John eased himself up beside the log and stood wetting his dark lips with his red tongue, watching the two white men narrowly and a little sidewise, evidently ready to make one last bid for life with his heels if Abner drew his automatic.

Mr. Ditmas touched Abner's arm. "Come on, let's go back to town—this is one hell of a country!"

"John—you can go," said Abner slowly and enigmatically, though exactly why he should have to give John permission to leave him in the woods was a mystery. The black boy began walking away, taking quick cautious strides and most of the time looking back to see exactly what Abner was doing.

As the youth and the man returned to the village, Mr. Ditmas mentioned once more Abner's interest in the old Coltrane lands and said he had found out there was some claim on a tract of timber land he was trying to buy from Railroad Jones.

Abner answered more or less absently. The conversation was the veriest stopgap after the curious excitement of meeting the chore boy in the woods.

When the two friends entered the village again, they observed that all the Negro shacks at the edge of the village were deserted. Hardly a black person remained in Irontown. Some had fled to the woods until this white storm blew over; some were in the coloured church praying to God to preserve them; others had taken what few possessions they could carry in their arms and had deserted Irontown permanently for some other village. The experience of their