There were two men in Tickfall to whom everybody came with their troubles—Vinegar Atts, pastor of the Shoofly church, and Skeeter Butts, proprietor of the Hen-Scratch saloon. Both were reputed among their fellows to be wise in all human experience and equal to every emergency of life upon the earth. Generally a man in trouble went first to Vinegar Atts, after which he poured his tale into the ear of Skeeter Butts. Each of these modern solons gave the troubled one some expert advice; then the preacher and the barkeeper got together and held a consultation, in which, as in a consultation of physicians, the diagnosis of each was confirmed, but the treatment was changed.
This time it was Shin Bone in trouble. Shin was the proprietor of a hot-cat eating-house, which made him and his wife very popular in the community, for there seems to be a natural affinity between a colored person and a piece of fried catfish.
“Whut ails yo’ mind, Shin?” Vinegar asked as Shin sat down on the cabin porch, dropping his old wool hat at his feet.
“I’s in deep troubles,” Shin said sorrowfully.
“A nigger’s trouble is like de rainbow—’tain’t got no end,” Vinegar philosophized. “But I don’t turn no nigger friend down because his troubles won’t terminate. I’s willin’ to he’p you fer any amount up to one dollar.”
“’Tain’t money troubles,” Shin said. “My bizzness is doin’ fine, but I ain’t gittin’ along so powerful good in my fambly.”
“You ain’t got no fambly, excusin’ Whiffle an’ yo’ baby,” Vinegar observed.
“De baby is all right,” Shin explained; “but Whiffle ain’t doin’ so well.”
Vinegar sat for a while in an expectant attitude, waiting for Shin to go on with the narration; but Shin found it hard to tell what he had come to say. He made several abortive efforts to get his mouth to going which got no further than a wretched silence and made him look like an idiot.
“Well?” Vinegar bellowed. “Why don’t you say somepin? You ack like one of dese here deef an’ dumb mutes celebratin’ de Fo’th of July wis noiseless powder.”
“My ailment is dis,” Shin said desperately, speaking the words in a rush, as if in a hurry to get the confession over. “My wife, Whiffle, is payin’ entirely too much attention to yuther nigger men.”
Vinegar drew a corncob pipe from his pocket and took a long time to light it, while his attention seemed to be concentrated upon a row of dead trees whose snaggy branches were visible on the Little Mocassin Ridge, four miles away.
Shin fidgeted and twiddled his thumbs. Finally he reached down at his feet for his wool hat, and began to gnaw at its brim, as if he were starving to death. He had chewed nearly around the circuit of the brim before Vinegar took his eyes off the old dead trees; and even then Vinegar merely looked at him and said nothing.
“Yes, suh,” Shin continued, finding it eas............