"Dear Rufus, Please give my coachman Jim four ladles and two spoons from your store, and...

"Dear Rufus, Please give my coachman Jim four ladles and two spoons from your store, and make sure he doesn't eat any more store-bought biscuits from you. He's fat enough as it is. Signed, Lewis Washington." [grunting, muttering] Goddamn that elephant-faced old bugger. Never done a day's work and feeding me boiled grits and sour biscuits. What-what did he expect? You weren't lying about one thing. But if what you say is true, if Old John Brown is coming, why'd he send a sissy to do a man's job? Ask him yourself when he comes. John Brown's gonna curdle your cheese for treating me like a liar. Either you is lying or you is not. It's hard to figure Old John Brown, hot as he is, gonna come here where all these weapons and soldiers is to fight for the coloreds' freedom. He a brave man if he living, but he ain't a straight fool. He putting his head right in the lion's mouth. Well, the Old Man said to kill a lion, you chop off its head, not its tail