“Cunnin as a cat a-runnin,”
“I hear Mattie Devore can be quite a dear,” he said—heah, Devoah, deah—and one of his crusty eyelids drooped. I have seen a fair number of salacious winks in my time, but none that was a patch on the one tipped me by that old man with the gold-headed cane. I felt a strong urge to knock his waxy beak of a nose off. The sound of it parting company from his face would be like the crack of a dead branch broken over a bent knee.
“Do you hear a lot, old-timer?” I asked.
“Oh, ayuh!” he said. His lips—dark as strips of liver—parted in a grin. His gums swarmed with white patches. He had a couple of yellow teeth still planted in the top one, and a couple more on the bottom. “And she gut that little one—cunnin, she is! Ayuh!”
“Cunnin as a cat a-runnin,” I agreed.
He blinked at me, a little surprised to hear such an old one out of my presumably newfangled mouth, and then that reprehensible grin widened. “Her don’t mind her, though,” he said. “Baby gut the run of the place, don’tcha know.”
