“He’s our man,” said Calvin. “But what made you think those were dolls they were handing over?” asked Calvin.

“I got a good look at only one. It was larger than the others. It was a doll.”

“Well the others aren’t.”

“But they are something, am I right?”

“Oh, they’re something all right. Wish I could ask them what it is. How they get powers into those things.”

“What are they, if they aren’t dolls?”

“They’re nothing. I mean they don’t look like anything. Knotted cloth, strings, threads, iron, wood, bits of this and that. No two alike.”

“Ah, for the knack of your brother’s wife.”

“We’ll find out soon enough.”

“But is it not ironic that we spend all day watching and waiting, and now that we have found this man, we still have no idea what he’s doing, but she already knows?”

“What makes you think she knows anything?” demanded Calvin.

“Because she can see into that man’s heartfire. She has watched us all day, and the moment we saw him, she could hop over and look inside him and know it all.”

“Damn,” said Calvin, looking at Honoré with annoyance. “Don’t go telling me you can feel when she’s looking at you?”

“I didn’t have to feel anything,” said Honoré. “I knew she would because she was curious. She would see in our heartfires that we were going to search for this man, so she would watch us. Obvious.”

“To you.”

“Of course to me. I am the world’s leading authority on the behavior of human beings.”

“In your opinion.”

“But you see, I am the kind of man who always thinks he is the best in the world at whatever he does. So are you. It is one of the ways we are alike.”

Calvin grinned. “Damn right.”

“The difference between us is that I am correct in that opinion.”

Calvin’s eyes squinted again. “Someday I’m not’ going to pretend I think you’re joking when you say things like that.”

“What will you do to punish me, make me wake up under a hedge with a terrible headache and my clothing covered with urine?”

The women were coming down now, naked to the waist and roped, not chained together, though the ropes had chafed their wrists and ankles enough to draw blood.

“Your brother’s wife already knows the name of this bringer of water, and where he lives, and what he had for breakfast,” said Honoré.

“Yeah, well, we’ll know soon enough.”

“Do you think he won’t notice two White men following him?”

Calvin grinned wickedly. “Like I said, I can do everything that needs doing. I can follow him without him seeing us or knowing he was followed.”

“Using your doodoobug?”

“Doodlebug.”

“But you do not know all the hidden powers this Black man might have. How do you know he won’t catch your doodlebug and hold it captive?”

Calvin started to scoff at this idea, but then grew solemn. “You know, I’d be a fool to think he’s not dangerous just cause he acts dumb around the foreman.”