"Hello!"
The swamper looked up at Val's hail but this time he did not leave.
"Hullo," he answered sullenly.
Val stood there, ill at ease, while the swamper eyed him composedly.
What could he say now? Val's embarrassment must have been very apparent,
for after a long moment Jeems smiled derisively.
"Yo' goin' ridin' in them funny pants?" he asked, pointing to the
other's breeches.
"Well, that's what they are intended for," Val replied.
"Wheah's youah hoss?"
"I sent him back to Sam's." Val was beginning to feel slightly warm. He
decided that Jeems' manners were not all that they might be.
"Sam!" the swamp boy spat into the water. "He's a--"
But what Sam was, in the opinion of the swamper, Val never learned, for
at that moment Ricky burst from between two bushes.
"Well, at last," she panted, "I've gotten rid of my army. Val, do you
think that Lucy is going to be like this all the time--order us about, I
mean?"
"Who's that?" Jeems was on his feet looking at Ricky.
"Ricky," her brother said, "this is Jeems. My sister Richanda."
"Yo' one of the folks up at the big house?" he asked her directly.
"Why, yes," she answered simply.
"Yo' don' act like yo' was." He stabbed his finger at both of them. "Yo'
don't walk with youah noses in the air looking down at us--"
"Of course we don't!" interrupted Ricky. "Why should we, when you know
more about this place than we do?"
"What do yo' mean by that?" he flashed out at her, his sullen face
suddenly dark.
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