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She's sittin' on the bench far away from the light, and she's dressed in a second-hand horse blanket, a feed sack, and a bran' new pair of ar'tics. And she don't say a word. "'Well, says I, 'if she ain't some kind of nigger, I'll eat my "But there he is, all of a sudden, squarin' off in front o' me, his mug stuck up and his eyes like a couple o' headlights. Imagine!
I was movin' off when I notices him still standin' sort of hesitatin'. "Well?" I adds. "Can I help?" "You don't happen to know," says he, "of a good eatin' house where it don't cost too all-fired much to git a square meal, do you?" "Why," says I, "I expect over on Eighth-ave., you could " And then I gets this rash notion of squarin' the account by blowin' him to a real feed.
Ellins, "you induce him to break his word to me and you hide him in another hotel." "Something like that," admits Auntie, squarin' her jaw. "Why not, Mr. Ellins?" "Why, Auntie!" gasps Vee. "Verona!" says Auntie, shootin' over a reprovin' look. "But see here," protests Old Hickory. "I was arranging with this man to fit out a treasure-hunting expedition. He had made a verbal contract with me.
"'En w'at's mo', sez de cunjuh man, comin' up close ter Dan en whusp'in' in his yeah, 'I knows who it is be'n ridin' you. "'Who is it? ax' Dan. 'Tell me who it is. "'It's a' ole nigger 'oman down by Rockfish Crick. She had a pet rabbit, en you cotch' 'im one day, en she's been squarin' up wid you eber sence. But you better stop her, er e'se you'll be rid ter def in a mont' er so.
He laughed when she caught her breath; when he noted that she recognized the name. "I reckoned you'd know me, when I told you," he said. "Luke Lawler knowed me an' your son knows me! I've never had no love for the Lawler breed, an' I ain't changed any. But there's a lot of things that I'm squarin' up for! "This is my night; I've been waitin' for it!" he gloated. "I'm cleanin' up on the Lawlers!
"Mary," she said, "I don't measure people with a two-foot rule. I take a ten-foot pole, and let it cover all that comes under it. Them that does their dooty to Man, I guess you won't have much trouble in squarin' accounts with the Lord. You know how I feel towards you without my tellin' of it, and them that's quick o' the tongue are always full o' the heart.
Say, in all the hundreds o' miles you've traveled sence you quit the creek ther' ain't bin a move as you've took I ain't looked on at. I've trailed you, headed you, bin alongside you, an' located wher' you wus makin', an' come along an' waited on you. Ther's a score 'tween you an' me as wants squarin'. I'm right here fer to squar' that score."
He said he'd lied to Ben about you an' that he'd shot him so's his sister would think you done it. You've been white, an' so I'm squarin' things for you. I'm wishin' you luck." For an instant he sat in the saddle, watching a new color surge into the stray-man's face. Then his pony was led away, through a tangle of undergrowth at the edge of the cottonwood.
She did not enlighten him. "Mebbe it ain't honest to let him go on thinkin' he's had nothin' to eat," she whispered to herself, "but if all them muffins, an' oatmeal, an' coffee don't do nothin' toward remindin' him he's et once, I ain't goin' to do it. This second meal will make up fur the breakfast he missed yesterday. I ain't deceivin' him; I'm simply squarin' things up."
I guess I got a good deal o' squarin' t' do, but I'm goin' t' begin ut. An' all these things happenin' along o' Chris'mus, an' little Shaver an' his ma bein' so friendly like, an' her gittin' me t' help straighten out them ole gents, an' doin' all I done an' not gettin' pinched seems more 'n jes' luck; it's providential's wot ut is!"
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