Skeeter sat down at the same table and opened his mouth to deliver his mind of all its burden of trouble; but the white man put such a successful cloture on the colored man’s oratory that Skeeter could not speak a word for a long time. Nuhat thrust both hands into his pockets and brought them out full of silver and currency. He did not speak a word of greeting. He merely laid the money on the top of the table and watched Skeeter’s popping eyes.
“You ought to have been at the races, Skeeter,” Nuhat said at last. “We mopped up!”
Skeeter needed no proof of this beyond the tabletop covered with money; but even yet he could not find a word to say.
“There is over six hundred dollars of it that says we win, Skeeter,” Nuhat laughed.
“Whut hoss win?” Skeeter asked with stiff lips.
“Your horse,” Nuhat replied. “Don’t you remember that you bought a horse? Your ten-share nigger horse that I sold you. I sneaked him out of the pasture, took him to Shongaloon to the races, and mopped up this money.”
“I been huntin’ fer dat hoss eve’ywhar,” Skeeter sighed. “I shore missed him. I’s had a lot of trouble ’bout dat hoss!”
“You won’t ever see him again,” Nuhat responded.
“How come?”
Nuhat hesitated a minute, looking sharply at Skeeter. He seemed undecided what to say in reply, but finally ventured:
“I didn’t own that horse in the first place. That horse’s real name is Springer, and its real owner is Old Griff.”
Skeeter opened his eyes until they were like china door-knobs. He wondered why he had not recognized the most famous race-horse in Louisiana, named Springer because of his peculiar springy gait.
“I borrowed Springer from Old Griff’s stable without requesting the loan of him,” Nuhat continued. “Old Griff came to Shongaloon after him. He was real nice about it, after I had talked to him about four hours. At first he wanted to put me in jail for horse-stealing.”
“My Lawd, white man!” Skeeter ranted. “Dat wus a awful risky thing to do. Glory to gracious! To think dat a nigger like me one time owned three-tenths of Springer—fo’-tenths—my Lawd, I owned all of him, fer dem niggers made me give deir money back!”
“That’s some glory for you, Skeeter!” Nuhat assured him.
“How come dat Old Griff didn’t put you in de jail-house?” the colored man asked.
“I had four quarts of prime Kentucky whisky when I started in this adventure. I took it with me to placate Old Griff when he caught me with the goods. It worked. Toward the end of the second quart he offered to make me a present of the horse.”
“You means to say all dis money is yourn?” Skeeter asked, waving his hand over the table.
“It’s ours,” Nuhat replied. “I came back to whack up even with you.”
“Bless Gawd fer a noble white man!” Skeeter exclaimed. “How come you tuck a notion to come back here to me?”
“I might have kept on traveling,” the white man said meditatively, choosing his words cautiously; “but I wanted to have friends in Tickfall in case Old Griff sobered up and began to trail his horse and ask questions along the way. Besides, down at the bottom of me, I’m honest, or want to be.”
He counted out ninety dollars and handed it to Skeeter.
“This don’t go into the divide,” he explained. “This is the sum you originally invested in our business enterprise. The rest is ours—not honestly acquired, perhaps; but I was up against it, and had to have some coin.”
They had five hundred and forty dollars to divide ............