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Read Ebook: More E. K. Means Is This a Title? It Is Not. It Is the Name of a Writer of Negro Stories Who Has Made Himself So Completely the Writer of Negro Stories That This Second Book Like the First Needs No Title by Means E K Eldred Kurtz Kemble E W Edward Windsor Illustrator
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Ebook has 3280 lines and 89070 words, and 66 pages
"Lem," he said, "if that cannibal chief had showed me that wound I would have bought Diada if she had cost me a thousand dollars."
"Certainly, Tom," Manse replied quietly. "There was nothing else for me to do."
Diada turned and walked back to the lawn, taking the same motionless posture, gazing out toward the purple haze of the Little Moccasin Swamp.
Gaitskill sat down, lit a cigar, and gave himself up to deep thought. Then he asked:
"Now that you've got her, Lem, what are you going to do with her?"
"I'm going to give her to you!" Lem said quietly.
"Wha-what?" Gaitskill barked, springing to his feet again. "Good gosh!"
"I won't," Gaitskill snapped. "You can bet on it, I won't!"
"Well, keep her here for me for two weeks," Manse pleaded. "I've got to run up to St. Louis on some business, and when I come back, I'll take her away with me."
"That sounds easy," Gaitskill remarked. "Do you think Diada will stay with me?"
"Yes, if I tell her to."
"All right," Gaitskill assented. "I'll keep her. I'll turn her over to the care of the niggers and forget her--if I can. But I want you to give her all the instructions necessary for the next two weeks. I don't speak cannibal."
HITCH HAS VAGUE MISGIVINGS
When Captain Lemuel Manse and his wife had been whirled away in the Gaitskill automobile to the Tickfall landing where their yacht awaited them in the Mississippi River, Gaitskill sat down on the porch to think over his troubles.
Diada stood before him on the lawn, motionless and ugly as a heathen idol, her eyes still watching the purple haze above the swamp.
"Something over in that swamp has got to be hypnotized," Gaitskill muttered to himself as he watched her. "When she gets a little tame I'll take her for a trip to the hog-camp. I suppose she never saw anything but a cocoanut palm."
He leaned over the porch railing; looked back toward the rear of the house; cupped his hands around his mouth like a trumpet, and bellowed:
"Oh, Hitch! Come here! Hear me!"
"Yes, suh, white folks! Comin'! Comin' wid a looseness; comin' right now!"
Hitch came, but he chose a very unusual route--through the house. Arriving at the door which admitted him to the porch where Gaitskill sat, he stopped, peeped at Gaitskill, then peeped at Diada, and ducked back into the room.
"Come here, Hitch!" Gaitskill commanded.
"Excuse me, Marse Tom," Hitch muttered. "I's axin' you whut you wants?"
"Come out here! What in the name of mud is the matter with you?" Gaitskill bawled.
Hitch came out, his ponderous feet paddling along the floor like a lame duck, while his eyes never strayed from the broad, hunched back of Diada.
"'Scuse me, Marse Tom," Hitch pleaded. "Dat new she-queen you's hired to dec'rate dat lawn is done deprive me of my goat!"
"Don't be a fool, Hitch!" Gaitskill snapped, smothering a desire to laugh. "That nigger woman is Captain Lemuel Manse's house-servant. She'll be here with us two weeks. I want you and Hopey to treat her kindly and make her feel at home."
"Boss, is she gentle?" Hitch asked as if he were alluding to a newly purchased horse.
"Certainly," Gaitskill assured him. "What's the matter with you? Diada is just a nigger woman like Hopey."
"Mebbe so suh," Hitch mumbled. "But she shore don't look like Hopey in looks."
"Take her around to the kitchen and give her something to eat," Gaitskill commanded.
"She told you nothing of the sort!" Gaitskill snapped. "Take Diada to the kitchen. Tell Hopey I said feed her. Hear me?"
Hitch's whole body moved in the general direction of Diada, with the exception of his feet. He swayed toward her like a pendulum, and then swung back. He took a big breath, looked at Gaitskill, and muttered:
"Thunderation!" Gaitskill roared. "Come down here in the yard with me!"
"Yes, suh; I's right on yo' hip. I'll foller as fur as you leads de way."
Gaitskill laid his hand upon Diada's arm, and she turned and looked at him with a suspicious glance, like the expression in the eyes of a dog when petted by a stranger. Hitch backed away.
"Look out, Marse Tom!" Hitch howled. "She's gittin' ready to kick!"
In a moment Diada's eyes changed to a milder expression, and Gaitskill patted her on the shoulder about as he would caress the side of a horse. Seeing this, Hitch crept up nearer, put out his hand and touched Diada's wrist.
"She feels like a shore-'nuff, nachel-bawn nigger, Marse Tom," he exclaimed. "Kin she talk?"
"Yes," Gaitskill told him. "But she can't talk our language, Hitch. She hasn't been in this country long. You'll have to make signs to her and talk to her that way."
"Ax her to say somepin', Marse Tom!" Hitch begged. "Lemme hear how she sounds!"
Gaitskill had not the remotest idea how to make her talk; in fact, he had never heard the sound of her voice. But he did not intend to reveal his ignorance to Hitch Diamond.
"No," he said. "She can talk in the kitchen. Take her around to Hopey."
Hitch walked up, crooked his forefinger, hung it lightly in the sleeve of Diada's dress, and murmured:
"Come along with me, Sister Diada--foller along atter brudder Hitchie Diamond--us'll go git some hot vittles!"
Diada took one step forward; Hitch winced as if anticipating a kick and stopped.
Gaitskill laughed, caught Diada by the sleeve, and led her to the kitchen.
Hopey, the cook, had just taken a pan of hot biscuit out of the oven when the door opened and Diada came in, filling the doorway like a picture in a frame and concealing Mr. Gaitskill, who walked behind her. Hopey's biscuit-pan hit the floor with a bang, the biscuit rolled around the kitchen, and Hopey sank down in a heap on the nearest chair, covering her head with her flour-sprinkled apron.
"Oh, my Lawd," she said, rocking herself from side to side and whimpering like a puppy. "De ole debbil is done come to git me at last!"
"Shut up, Hopey!" Gaitskill commanded. "Get up from there!"
"Oh, Marse Tom!" Hopey whooped. "Is de Ole Scratch gone?"
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