Part 12 (2/2)

”Well, the war brought hard times both for master and man, and there were no flowery beds of ease even for the officers who wore the gray.

Robert Fairfax took the fortunes of the conflict like a man and a Virginia gentleman, and with him Cahoots.

”It was at Malvern Hill that the young Confederate led his troops into battle, and all day long the booming of the cannon and the crash of musketry rising above the cries of the wounded and dying came to the ears of the slave waiting in his tent for his master's return. Then in the afternoon a scattered fragment came straggling back into the camp.

Cahoots went out to meet them. The firing still went on.

”'Whah's Mas' Bob?' his voice pierced through the cannon's thunder.

”'He fell at the front, early in the battle.'

”'Whah's his body den, ef he fell?'

”'We didn't have time to look for dead bodies in that murderous fire. It was all we could do to get our living bodies away.'

”'But I promised not to go back without him.' It was a wail of anguish from the slave.

”'Well, you'll have to.'

”'I won't. Whah did he fall?'

”Someone sketched briefly the approximate locality of Robert Fairfax's resting place, and on the final word Cahoots tore away.

”The merciless shot of the Federals was still raking the field. But amid it all an old prairie schooner, gotten from G.o.d knows where, started out from the dismantled camp across the field. 'Some fool going to his death,' said one of the gray soldiers.

”A ragged, tattered remnant of the wagon came back. The horses were bleeding and staggering in their steps. The very harness was cut by the b.a.l.l.s that had grazed it. But with a light in his eyes and the look of a hero, Cahoots leaped from the tattered vehicle and began dragging out the body of his master.

”He had found him far to the front in an abandoned position and brought him back over the field of the dead.

”'How did you do it?' They asked him.

”'I jes' had to do it,' he said. 'I promised not to go home widout him, and I didn't keer ef I did git killed. I wanted to die ef I couldn't find Mas' Bob's body.'

”He carried the body home, and mourned at the burial, and a year later came back to the regiment with the son who had come after Robert, and was now just of fighting age. He went all through this campaign, and when the war was over, the two struck away into the mountains. They came back after a while, neither one having taken the oath of allegiance, and if there were any rebels Cahoots was as great a one to the day of his death as his master. That tomb-stone, you see it looks old, was placed there at the old master's request when his dead son came home from Malvern Hill, for he said when Cahoots went to the other side they must not be separated; that accounts for its look of age, but it was not until last year that we laid Cahoots--Cahoots still though an old man--beside his master. And many a man that had owned his people, and many another that had fought to continue that owners.h.i.+p, dropped a tear on his grave.”

_Nine_

THE PROMOTER

Even as early as September, in the year of 1870, the newly emanc.i.p.ated had awakened to the perception of the commercial advantages of freedom, and had begun to lay snares to catch the fleet and elusive dollar. Those controversialists who say that the Negro's only idea of freedom was to live without work are either wrong, malicious, or they did not know Little Africa when the boom was on; when every little African, fresh from the fields and cabins, dreamed only of untold wealth and of mansions in which he would have been thoroughly uncomfortable. These were the devil's sunny days, and early and late his mowers were in the field. These were the days of benefit societies that only benefited the shrewdest man; of mutual insurance a.s.sociations, of wild building companies, and of gilt-edged land schemes wherein the unwary became bogged. This also was the day of Mr. Jason Buford, who, having been free before the war, knew a thing or two, and now had set himself up as a promoter. Truly he had profited by the example of the white men for whom he had so long acted as messenger and factotum.

As he frequently remarked when for purposes of business he wished to air his Biblical knowledge, ”I jest takes the Scripter fur my motter an'

foller that ol' pa.s.sage where it says, 'Make hay while the sun s.h.i.+nes, fur the night cometh when no man kin work.'”

It is related that one of Mr. Buford's customers was an old plantation exhorter. At the first suggestion of a Biblical quotation the old gentleman closed his eyes and got ready with his best amen. But as the import of the words dawned on him he opened his eyes in surprise, and the amen died a-borning. ”But do hit say dat?” he asked earnestly.

”It certainly does read that way,” said the promoter glibly.

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