Ten days had passed. At the Nigger-Heel plantation Mustard Prophet, nursing a battered head, was curing an alligator skin which he had nailed upon a barn door, and was keeping careful guard over two green-plush boxes, each containing a rabbit-foot.
Mustard entered the junk-room full of Marse Tom’s curiosities, opened a drawer in a desk, and brought forth the two luck charms which had caused him so much trouble.
“It ’pears to me like dese here lef’ hind foots is lost dere power,” he muttered to himself.
He held up one box which looked rather messy, because Mustard had rescued it from an alligator’s stomach. He continued his soliloquy:
“Now you take de hist’ry of dis here foot: Cap’n Kerlerac gib dis’n to Miss Virginia Gaitskill fifteen years ago when she warn’t nothin’ but a little ole spindle-leg gal. An’ whut come to pass? Her paw an’ maw died in furin parts somewhar an’ she had to move back to Tickfall. Little Bit tole little Marse Org dat a rabbit-foot fotch luck, so he stole dis’n out of his sister’s room, swiped a pipe an’ smoked rabbit terbacker, an’ mighty nigh died. When Skeeter Butts tuck Org home an seen dis rabbit-foot, he thought it wus mine an’ I thought it wus mine because it looked jes’ like mine. So I sneaked up to Miss Virginia’s room to steal it back, an’ I had my hand on de very place whar it wus, when dat little ole Org boy skeart de gizzard outen me, playin’ Indian an’ whoopin’ behime my back.
“An’ Skeeter swiped dis foot fer me, an’ hopped in his automobile to make his escapement, an’ he run off a busted bridge into de Cooley bayou, chased by all de hawgs an’ sheeps an’ cattle an’ hosses an’ mules an’ dawgs an’ mens in Tickfall. Atter dat, Skeeter tried to fotch dis rabbit-foot back to Miss Virginia because it ’twarn’t de one we wanted, an’ he had dis foot on his own pusson when he tuck dat hell-bustin’ tumble down Marse Tom’s steps, an’ he had it in his hand when he snuck across de yard an’ dat alligator tried to eat him up. Den Skeeter throwed dis rabbit-foot, plush box an’ all, down dat alligator’s gullet, an’ whut happened to dat varmint atter he swallowed dis foot, an’ had all de luck inside his own hide? He got kilt!”
He laid this unlucky foot back in the green-plush box, placed it reverently in the drawer, shaking his head over the mystery how a luck charm could be attended with so much misfortune.
“Naw, suh, dis’n is done lost de power,” he announced.
Then he lifted the other green-plush box, lifted a rabbit-foot out of it, and gazed with sacred awe upon this talisman.
“Dis here is Marse Tom’s left hind foot of a rabbit kilt in a graveyard in de dark............