The Battle Ground | Page 4

tree that threw its naked shadow
across the turnpike. Beyond the tree and its shadow a well-worn
foot-path led to a small log cabin from which a streak of smoke was
rising. Through the open door the single room within showed ruddy
with the blaze of resinous pine.
The little girl daintily picked her way along the foot-path and through a
short garden patch planted in onions and black-eyed peas. Beside a bed
of sweet sage she faltered an instant and hung back. "Aunt Ailsey," she
called tremulously, "I want to speak to you, Aunt Ailsey." She stepped
upon the smooth round stone which served for a doorstep and looked
into the room. "It's me, Aunt Ailsey! It's Betty Ambler," she said.
A slow shuffling began inside the cabin, and an old negro woman
hobbled presently to the daylight and stood peering from under her
hollowed palm. She was palsied with age and blear-eyed with trouble,
and time had ironed all the kink out of the thin gray locks that straggled
across her brow. She peered dimly at the child as one who looks from a
great distance.
"I lay dat's one er dese yer ole hoot owls," she muttered querulously,
"en ef'n 'tis, he des es well be a-hootin' along home, caze I ain' gwine
be pestered wid his pranks. Dar ain' but one kind er somebody es will
sass you at yo' ve'y do,' en dat's a hoot owl es is done loss count er de
time er day--"
"I ain't an owl, Aunt Ailsey," meekly broke in Betty, "an' I ain't hootin'
at you--"
Aunt Ailsey reached out and touched her hair. "You ain' none er Marse
Peyton's chile," she said. "I'se done knowed de Amblers sence de fu'st
one er dem wuz riz, en dar ain' never been a'er Ambler wid a carrot
haid--"
The red ran from Betty's curls into her face, but she smiled politely as

she followed Aunt Ailsey into the cabin and sat down in a
split-bottomed chair upon the hearth. The walls were formed of rough,
unpolished logs, and upon them, as against an unfinished background,
the firelight threw reddish shadows of the old woman and the child.
Overhead, from the uncovered rafters, hung several tattered sheepskins,
and around the great fireplace there was a fringe of dead snakes and
lizards, long since as dry as dust. Under the blazing logs, which filled
the hut with an almost unbearable heat, an ashcake was buried beneath
a little gravelike mound of ashes.
Aunt Ailsey took up a corncob pipe from the stones and fell to smoking.
She sank at once into a senile reverie, muttering beneath her breath
with short, meaningless grunts. Warm as the summer evening was, she
shivered before the glowing logs.
For a time the child sat patiently watching the embers; then she leaned
forward and touched the old woman's knee. "Aunt Ailsey, O Aunt
Ailsey!"
Aunt Ailsey stirred wearily and crossed her swollen feet upon the
hearth.
"Dar ain' nuttin' but a hoot owl dat'll sass you ter yo' face," she
muttered, and, as she drew her pipe from her mouth, the gray smoke
circled about her head.
The child edged nearer. "I want to speak to you, Aunt Ailsey," she said.
She seized the withered hand and held it close in her own rosy ones. "I
want you--O Aunt Ailsey, listen! I want you to conjure my hair coal
black."
She finished with a gasp, and with parted lips sat waiting. "Coal black,
Aunt Ailsey!" she cried again.
A sudden excitement awoke in the old woman's face; her hands shook
and she leaned nearer. "Hi! who dat done tole you I could conjure,
honey?" she demanded.

"Oh, you can, I know you can. You conjured back Sukey's lover from
Eliza Lou, and you conjured all the pains out of Uncle Shadrach's leg."
She fell on her knees and laid her head in the old woman's lap.
"Conjure quick and I won't holler," she said.
"Gawd in heaven!" exclaimed Aunt Ailsey. Her dim old eyes
brightened as she gently stroked the child's brow with her palsied
fingers. "Dis yer ain' no way ter conjure, honey," she whispered. "You
des wait twel de full er de moon, w'en de devil walks de big road." She
was wandering again after the fancies of dotage, but Betty threw herself
upon her. "Oh, change it! change it!" cried the child. "Beg the devil to
come and change it quick."
Brought back to herself, Aunt Ailsey grunted and knocked the ashes
from her pipe. "I ain' gwine ter ax no favors er de devil," she replied
sternly. "You des let de devil alont en he'll let you alont. I'se done been
young, en I'se now ole, en I ain' never seed de devil stick his