coughing, and started groping his way to the edge of the dust-cloud.
In the rush of the moment the swift change in Peter's situation appeared only natural. He followed Tump, so distressed by the dust and disturbed over Cissie that he hardly thought of his peculiar position. The dust pinched the upper part of his throat, stung his nose. Tears trickled from his eyes, and he pressed his finger against his upper lip, trying not to sneeze. He was still struggling against the sneeze when Tump recovered his speech.
“Wh-whut you reckon she done, Peter? She don' shoot craps, nor boot- laig, nor—” He fell to coughing.
Peter got out a handkerchief and wiped his eyes.
“Let's go—to the Dildine house,” he said.
The two moved hurriedly through the thinning cloud, and presently came to breathable air, where they could see the houses around them.
“I know she done somp'n; I know she done somp'n,” chanted Tump, with the melancholy cadence of his race. He shook his dusty head. “You ain't never been in jail, is you, black man?”
Peter said he had not.
“Lawd! it ain't no place fuh a woman,” declared Tump. “You dunno nothin' 'bout it, black man. It sho ain't no place fuh a woman.”
A notion of an iron cage floated before Peter's mind. The two negroes trudged on through the cres-
