“Well, Mr. Braboy, it ’s what you might have expected when you turned your back on your own people and married a white woman.  You were n’t content with being a slave to the white folks once, but you must try it again.  Some people never know when they ’ve got enough.  I don’t see that there ’s any help for you; unless,” he added suggestively, “you had a good deal of money.”

’"Pears ter me I heared somebody say sence I be’n up heah, dat it wuz ‘gin de law fer w’ite folks an’ colored folks ter marry.”

“That was once the law, though it has always been a dead letter in Groveland.  In fact, it was the law when you got married, and until I introduced a bill in the legislature last fall to repeal it.  But even that law did n’t hit cases like yours.  It was unlawful to make such a marriage, but it was a good marriage when once made.”

“I don’ jes’ git dat th’oo my head,” said Wellington, scratching that member as though to make a hole for the idea to enter.

“It ’s quite plain, Mr. Braboy.  It ’s unlawful to kill a man, but when he ’s killed he ’s just as dead as though the law permitted it.  I ’m afraid you have n’t much of a case, but if you ’ll go to work and get twenty-five dollars together, I ’ll see what I can do for you.  We may be able to pull a case through on the ground of extreme cruelty.  I might even start the case if you brought in ten dollars.”

Wellington went away sorrowfully.  The laws of Ohio were very little more satisfactory than those of North Carolina.  And as for the ten dollars,—­the lawyer might as well have told him to bring in the moon, or a deed for the Public Square.  He felt very, very low as he hurried back home to supper, which he would have to go without if he were not on hand at the usual supper-time.

But just when his spirits were lowest, and his outlook for the future most hopeless, a measure of relief was at hand.  He noticed, when he reached home, that Mrs. Braboy was a little preoccupied, and did not abuse him as vigorously as he expected after so long an absence.  He also perceived the smell of strange tobacco in the house, of a better grade than he could afford to use.  He thought perhaps some one had come in to see about the washing; but he was too glad of a respite from Mrs. Braboy’s rhetoric to imperil it by indiscreet questions.

Next morning she gave him fifty cents.

“Braboy,” she said, “ye ‘ve be’n helpin’ me nicely wid the washin’, an’ I ‘m going ter give ye a holiday.  Ye can take yer hook an’ line an’ go fishin’ on the breakwater.  I ‘ll fix ye a lunch, an’ ye need n’t come back till night.  An’ there ’s half a dollar; ye can buy yerself a pipe er terbacky.  But be careful an’ don’t waste it,” she added, for fear she was overdoing the thing.

Uncle Wellington was overjoyed at this change of front on the part of Mrs. Braboy; if she would make it permanent he did not see why they might not live together very comfortably.