I'll hev
it full agin an' fire up by to-morrer evenin'."
"Do you hang it right up after cutting?" asked the officer.
"Wal, we mout do so. Tain't no hurt ter do it dat er way, only it
handles better ter let it hang on de sticks a while an' git sorter
wilted--don't break de leaves off ner mash 'em up so much loadin'
an" unloadin', yer know," answered Nimbus.
"How much have you got here?" asked the sheriff, casting his eye
over the field; "forty thousand?"
"Wal," said Nimbus, "I made up sixty thousand hills, but I hed ter
re-set some on 'em. I s'pose it'll run somewhere between fifty an'
sixty thousand."
"A right good crop," said the sheriff. "I doubt if any man in the
county has got a better, take it all 'round."
"I don't reckon ther's one wukked enny harder fer what he's got,"
said the colored man quietly.
"No, I'll guarantee ther hain't," said the other, laughing. "Nobody
ever accused you of being lazy, Nimbus. They only fault you fer
being too peart."
"All 'cause I wants my own, an' wuks fer it, an' axes nobody enny
odds, but only a fa'r show--a white man's chance ter git along,"
responded Nimbus, with a touch of defiance in his tone.
"Well, well," said the sheriff good-naturedly, "I won't never fault
ye for that, but they do say you're the only man, white er black,
that ever got ahead of Potem Desmit in a trade yet. How's that,
Nimbus?"
"I paid him all he axed," said the colored man, evidently flattered
by this tribute to his judgment as to the value of Red Wing.
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