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"Good-by, sir," said Bibbs, meekly. Bibbs's room, that neat apartment for transients to which the "lamidal" George had shown him upon his return, still bore the appearance of temporary quarters, possibly because Bibbs had no clear conception of himself as a permanent incumbent.
"It's a lamiDAL statue." "Hiyi!" George exulted. "Man! Man! Listen! Well, suh, she mighty lamiDAL statue, but lamiDAL statue heap o' trouble to dus'!" "I expect she is!" said Bibbs, as the engine began to churn; and a moment later he was swept from sight. George turned to Mist' Jackson, who had been listening benevolently in the hallway.
"I nev' DID hear it!" said George. "I uz dess sittin' thinkum to myse'f an' she pop in my head 'lamiDAL, dess like 'at! An' she soun' so good, seem like she GOTTA mean somep'm!" "Come to think of it, I believe she does mean something. Why, yes " "Do she?" cried George. "WHAT she mean?" "It's exactly the word for the statue," said Bibbs, with conviction, as he climbed into the car.
"Same he aw-ways say, Mist' Jackson 'I expec' she is! Ev'y day he try t' git me talk 'bout 'at lamiDAL statue, an' aw-ways, las' thing HE say, 'I expec' she is! You know, Mist' Jackson, if he git well, 'at young man go' be pride o' the family, Mist' Jackson. Yes-suh, right now I pick 'im fo' firs' money!" "Look out with all 'at money, George!" Jackson warned the enthusiast.
This singular prophecy, founded somewhat recklessly upon gratitude for the meaning of "lamiDAL," differed radically from another prediction concerning Bibbs, set forth for the benefit of a fair auditor some twenty minutes later. Jim Sheridan, skirting the edges of the town with Mary Vertrees beside him, in his own swift machine, encountered the invalid upon the highroad.
Gazing down the hall, Bibbs saw heroic wreckage, seemingly Byzantine painted colossal fragments of the shattered torso, appallingly human; and gilded and silvered heaps of magnificence strewn among ruinous palms like the spoil of a barbarians' battle. There had been a massacre in the oasis the Moor had been hurled headlong from his pedestal. "He hit 'at ole lamidal statue," said George.
"LOOK!" George gasped, delighted to play herald for so important a tragedy; and he renewed upon his face the ghastly expression with which he had first beheld the ruins his calamitous gesture laid before the eyes of Bibbs. "Look at 'at lamidal statue!"
"You ast me when you firs' come home, an' you ast me nex' day, an' mighty near ev'y day all time you been here; an' las' Sunday you ast me twicet." He shook his head solemnly. "Look to me mus' be somep'm might lamiDAL 'bout 'at statue!" "Mighty what?" "Mighty lamiDAL!" George, burst out laughing. "What DO 'at word mean, Mist' Bibbs?" "It's new to me, George. Where did you hear it?"
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