But I'm
game."
The two friends walked out toward the shed where Tom's new
craft was housed. As yet Ned had not seen it. On the way they saw
Eradicate walking along, talking to himself, as he often did.
"I wonder what he has on his mind," remarked Ned musingly.
"Something does seem to be worrying him," agreed Tom.
As they neared the colored man, they could hear him saying:
"He suah did hab nerve, dat's what he did! De idea ob askin' me
all dem questions, an' den wantin' t' know if I'd sell him!"
"What's that, Eradicate?" asked Tom.
"Oh, it's a man I met when I were comin' back from de ash
dump," Eradicate explained. One of the colored man's duties was
to cart ashes away from Tom's various shops, and dump them in a
certain swampy lot. With an old ramshackle cart, and his mule,
Boomerang, Eradicate did this task to perfection.
"A man--what sort of a man?" asked Tom, always ready to be
suspicious of anything unusual.
"He were a queer man," went on the aged colored helper. "First
he stopped me an' asted me fo' a ride. He was a dressed-up
gen'man, too, an' I were suah s'prised at him wantin' t' set in
mah ole ash cart," said Eradicate.
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