large for long periods or escaped altogether.

These stories always interested Austin, with the result that one morning
he was absent when Mrs. Smith opened the store. He remained away 'eight
or nine days, I guess', before a friend of the Smiths found him near
Macon and threatened that he would 'half kill him' if he didn't return
immediately.

Either the threat--or the fact that in Macon there were no readily
available foodstuffs to be eaten all day as in the store--caused Austin
to return. He was roundly berated by his mistress, but finally forgiven
by the worried woman who needed his help around the store more than she
needed the contrite promises and effusive declarations that he would
'behave alright for the rest of his life.'

And he did behave; for several whole months. But by this tine he was 'a
great big boy', and he had caught sight of a young woman who took his
fancy on his trip to Macon. She was free herself; her father had bought
her freedom with that of her mother a few years before, and did odd jobs
for the white people in the city for a livelihood. Bill had thoughts of
going back to Macon, marrying her, and bringing her back 'to work for
Missus with me.' He asked permission to go, and was refused on the
grounds that his help was too badly needed at the store. Shortly
afterward he had again disappeared.

'Missus', however, knew too much of his plans by this time, and it was
no difficult task to have him apprehended in Macon. Bill may not have
had such great objections to the apprehension, either, he says, because
by this time he had learned that the young woman in Macon had no
slightest intention to give up her freedom to join him at Greensboro.