his great eyes was glued on Fiddy, as if he couldn't hardly keep from eatin'
of her up. An' she behaved consid'able well for a few months, as long
's the novelty lasted an' the silk dresses was new. Before Christmas,
though, she began to peter out 'n' git slack-twisted. She allers hated
housework as bad as a pig would a penwiper, an' Dixie hed to git
his own breakfast afore he went to work, or go off on an empty stomach.
Many 's the time he 's got her meals for her 'n' took 'em to her on a waiter.
Them secesh fellers'll wait on women folks long as they can stan' up.

"Then bime bye the baby come along; but that made
things wuss 'stid o' better. She didn't pay no more
'tention to it than if it hed belonged to the town.
She 'd go off to dances, an' leave Dixie to home tendin'
cradle; but that wa'n't no hardship to him for he was 'bout
as much wropped up in the child as he was in Fiddy.
Wall, sir, 'bout a month ago she up 'n' disappeared off the face o'
the airth 'thout sayin' a word or leavin' a letter.
She took her clo'es, but she never thought o' takin' the baby;
one baby more or less didn't make no odds to her s' long 's she
hed that skeeter-nettin' cape. Dixie sarched fer her high an'
low fer a fortnight, but after that he give it up as a bad job.
He found out enough, I guess, to keep him pretty busy thinkin'
what he 'd do next. But day before yesterday the same circus
that plays here this afternoon was playin' to Wareham.
A lot of us went over on the evenin' train, an' we coaxed
Dixie into goin', so 's to take his mind off his trouble.
But land! he didn't see nothin'. He 'd walk right up
the lions 'n' tigers in the menagerie as if they was cats
'n' chickens, an' all the time the clown was singin'
he looked like a dumb animile that 's hed a bullet put in him.