"Mr. Bobbs has to do his work, Mother," put in Peter. "I don't suppose
he enjoys it any more than we do."

"Den let 'im git out'n dis business an' git in anudder," scolded the old
woman. "Dis sho is a mighty po' business."

The ponderous Mr. Bobbs finished with a practised thoroughness his
inspection of the cabin, and then the inquisition proceeded down the
street, around the crescent, and so out of sight and eventually out of
hearing.

Old Caroline snapped her chair back beside her greasy table and sat down
abruptly to her spoiled ham again.

"Dat make me mad," she grumbled. "Ever' time a white pusson fail to lay
dey han' on somp'n, dey comes an' turns over ever'thing in my house."
She paused a moment, closed her eyes in thought, and then mused aloud:
"I wonder who is got Miss Arkwright's roaster."

The commotion of the constable's passing died in his wake, and
Niggertown resumed its careless existence. Dogs reappeared from under
the cabins and stretched in the sunshine; black children came out of
hiding and picked up their play; the frightened Ophelia came out of
Nan's cabin across the street and went her way; a lanky negro youth in
blue coat and pin-striped trousers appeared, coming down the squalid
thoroughfare whistling the "Memphis Blues" with bird-like virtuosity.
The lightness with which Niggertown accepted the moral side glance of a
blanket search-warrant depressed Siner.