Chapter X: Home Again

The entire congregation ran out of the building into the churchyard and looked up the street. To the end of their lives they never forgot what they saw.

Hitch Diamond, bareheaded, barefooted, dressed in a red undershirt and a pair of blue overalls, was walking down the middle of the street, his hands manacled behind him, his head hanging in shame.

Dust covered him from head to feet, and perspiration streamed down his face. He had tried to wipe the perspiration away by rubbing his head upon his broad shoulders, and this had smeared his face with mud until he was a horrible creature to behold.

Hitch looked old, he looked sick. All of the pride and jauntiness which had characterized him when he left Tickfall for the prize-fight had dropped away, and he was merely the shell of the man who had gone away from home to certain pugilistic victory.

On either side of Hitch Diamond rode a strange white man--New Orleans detectives employed by the mill owners of Sawtown to track the fugitive down. Behind the three rode the sheriff of Tickfall Parish, Mr. John Flournoy.

Dainty Blackum ran back into the church and brought from the pulpit a glass pitcher with a broken spout. She met Hitch and the officers right in front of the church, and the officers called a halt as she held the pitcher up to Hitch Diamond’s thirsty lips. Then, dipping a handkerchief into the water, she wiped the mud and sweat from the tortured man’s face.

Wail after wail arose from the crowd of negroes in front of the Shoofly Church, and Hitch turned and looked at them as if he did not realize where he was.

Vinegar Atts ran out and placed his trembling hand upon Sheriff Flournoy’s dusty stirrup.

“Whut dey got Hitch fer, Marse John?” he sobbed.

“Murder!” Flournoy growled through jaws which were shut together like a bear-trap. “He killed the night watchman at the Sawtown mill!”

The party started again, and Vinegar stood in his tracks as if turned to stone.

It seemed to take a few minutes for the Shoofly congregation to comprehend what Flournoy had said, or else the shock was so great that even their emotions could find no expression, voluble as they are as a race. Then a moan of sorrow swept like a deep-toned note from some mighty musical instrument; it was rich, melodious, heart-breaking--an expression of the deepest and most acute grief of their humble lives.

For Hitch was the hero of the colored population of Tickfall. They had shared his glory as victor in many a hard-fought fistic battle. They had won many dollars on his prowess as a boxer. They had helped to train him and perfect his wonderful physical organization for every contest he had ever participated in, and they loved him!

And Hitch deserved their affection. According to his lights he was a good man, a clean liver, one who took the best care he knew how of his superb body. There was nothing vicious or ugly about his disposition. He was merely a great, strong, bone-headed pugilist, who had made the most of himself by developing and using the best talent he possessed, namely, his giant strength.

Still moaning like the sea as the tide flows out, the Shoofly congregation flowed out into the road and fell in behind, forming a long procession of sorrowing friends.

Suddenly, above the low moan, in a tone which ripped and roared and snarled like the angry water breaking through a levee, came the mighty voice of Ginny Babe Chew:

“Murder! Murder! Murder! Whut do Gawd Awmighty think about dat?”

She pranced down the street, thrusting the people aside with her ponderous body as a steamboat cuts through the mushy ice upon a river. Her voice howled like a wolf’s call, with a taunting, bark-like, malicious, nerve-searing gratification:

“Murder!”

She managed to reach the head of the procession and walked just behind Sheriff Flournoy’s horse.

She whirled round and round like a Dervish, stooped and threw dust in the air, tore her clothes, and waving her fists at the sky shrieked like a maniac:

“Murder! Murder! Murder!”

John Flournoy stopped his horse, and turned and looked at her with a queer expression upon his face. Once he opened his mouth to speak, then shut his jaws tight, turned his eyes forward and rode on.

“Murder!” Ginny Babe Chew screamed.

Vinegar Atts could endure the horror no longer. He ran forward, and caught Ginny Babe by her fat shoulder and whirled her around. Vinegar had had years of experience as a pugilist and was Hitch’s boxing partner to this day. He knew exactly where to place his blow.

His open palm with all his strength behind it flattened upon Ginny Babe’s squalling lips. She uttered a low grunt, and fell in the street.

John Flournoy looked back and nodded his approval.

The crowd coming behind split in two halves, and walked around Ginny’s prostrate body, noting without pity that a stream of blood was flowing from her thick lips. The crowd behind had been augmented by hundreds before they reached the Hen-Scratch saloon.

Skeeter Butts had just come to town in his automobile, and was standing in front of his place of business. His face turned the color of ashes, and his lips stiffened with horror as he realized what was coming down the street to meet him.

“Oh, Hitch!” he wailed. “Shorely dey ain’t got you right, is dey, Hitch? Tell me dat dey done missed it!”

But Hitch was too tortured to reply. He cast one lingering look upon his friend, and turned away with blood-shot, agonized eyes. Skeeter Butts reeled back from the middle of the street and covered his eyes with his trembling hands.

For a while after that the procession moved forward in silence. Then a succession of piercing screams shattered the atmosphere. A handsome girl, whose hands and face were the color of old gold, came running down the street, and threw her arms around Hitch Diamond’s neck.

“Oh, Hitchie! Hitchie! Hitchie!” she screamed.

It was Goldie Curtain, Hitch’s wife.

For a moment Hitch’s giant body wavered, his knees bent under him, and he staggered as if about to fall. He stopped and leaned heavily upon the sobbing girl whose arms clasped his neck.

“Move on!” a sharp-voiced officer spoke.

Goldie Curtain fell in the dust of the street like one dead. Sheriff Flournoy, whose face was turned to look behind him, did not see her lying there. His nervous horse leaped over her prostrate body.

Vinegar Atts, sobbing aloud, picked the girl up in his powerful arms, carried her into her own house and placed her upon a bed. Then he came out and joined again with the crowd which followed Hitch until the doors of the jail closed behind him.

When Hitch had passed out of sight behind those doors, Ginny Babe Chew came staggering down the street, wiping the blood from her lips and the front of her dress. She stood in the middle of the street in front of the jail, shrieking like a maniac. She stooped and gathered handfuls of sand and tossed them into the air above her head, while her calliope-like voice shrieked again and again:

“Good-by, Hitch! Good-by, Hitch! Good-by, Hitch!”