Page:Post - Uncle Abner (Appleton, 1918).djvu/97

 his head, with a curious duck of the chin, toward the old negro. "I don't see anything—do I?"

Dabney came over to the table then; he took up the flask of liquor and a glass.

"Clabe," he said, "is this apple whisky?"

I have heard the ancient negro tell the story a thousand times. He gave a great shout of recognition. Those words—those five words—settled it. He used to sing this part in a long, nasal chant when he reached it in his tale: "Marse Dabney! Oh, my Lord! How many times ain't I heard 'im say dem words—jis' lak dat: 'Clabe, is dis apple whisky?' Dem outlandish clo's couldn't fool dis nigger! I'd 'a' knowed Marse Dabney after dat if he'd been 'parisoned in de garments ob Israel!"

But the old negro had Satan's time with Charlie, who held on to the table and cursed.

"You're not Dabney!" he cried. " I know you! You're old Lafitte, the Pirate, who helped General Jackson thrash the British at New Orleans. Grandfather used to tell about you!"

He began to cry and blame his grandfather for so vividly impressing the figure that it came up now in his liquor to annoy him. Then he would get his courage and shake a trembling fist across the table.

"You can't frighten me, Lafitte—curse you! I've seen worse things than you over there. I've seen the devil, with a spade, digging a grave; and a horsefly, as big as a buzzard, perched on the 84