That was no account, for our chiefs are Protestant here; and,
anyway, he had been making trouble about the drum for morning
school, and they were glad to give him a wipe. Now he swears old
Randall gave Adams poison or something, and when the two meet they
grin at each other like baboons."

He told this story as natural as could be, and like a man that
enjoyed the fun; though, now I come to think of it after so long,
it seems rather a sickening yarn. However, Case never set up to be
soft, only to be square and hearty, and a man all round; and, to
tell the truth, he puzzled me entirely.

I went home and asked Uma if she were a Popey, which I had made out
to be the native word for Catholics.

"E LE AI!" says she. She always used the native when she meant
"no" more than usually strong, and, indeed, there's more of it.
"No good Popey," she added.

Then I asked her about Adams and the priest, and she told me much
the same yarn in her own way. So that I was left not much farther
on, but inclined, upon the whole, to think the bottom of the matter
was the row about the sacrament, and the poisoning only talk.

The next day was a Sunday, when there was no business to be looked
for. Uma asked me in the morning if I was going to "pray"; I told
her she bet not, and she stopped home herself with no more words.
I thought this seemed unlike a native, and a native woman, and a
woman that had new clothes to show off; however, it suited me to
the ground, and I made the less of it. The queer thing was that I