I don't kill a nigger!" said the General with a smile. "I've got a settlement to make with the farm hands anyhow."
There was no help for it. When the court convened, and the young negro saw the face of his old master red with wrath, his heart failed him. He fled the town and there was no accusing witness.
The General gazed at the Agent with cold contempt and never opened his mouth in answer to expressions of regret at the fiasco.
A few moments later he rode up to the gate of his farm house on the river hills about a mile out of town. A strapping young fellow of fifteen hastened to open the gate.
"Well, Allan, my boy, how are you?"
"First rate, General. We're glad to see you! but we didn't make a half crop, sir, the niggers were always in town loafing around that Freedman's Bureau, holding meetings all night and going to sleep in the fields."
"Well, show me the books," said the General as they entered the house.
The General examined the accounts with care and then looked at young Allan McLeod for a moment as though he had made a discovery.
"Young man, you've done this work well."
"I tried to, sir. If the niggers dispute anything, I fixed that by making the store-keepers charge each item in two books, one on your account, and one on an account kept separate for every nigger."
"Good enough. They'll get up early to get ahead of you."
"I'm afraid they are going to make trouble at the Bureau, sir. That Agent's been here holding Union League meetings two or three nights every week, and he's got every nigger under his thumb."
