“Where did he come from, and what’s his name?”
“He ’lowed, one day, from Happy Valley, but he didn’t know whar Happy Valley war. An’ he talks like a town man, an’ reads a power, an’ tells tales ez Phemie say air out o’ books; an’ he gin a show”—
“A show?” the sheriff interrupted.
“A juggling show,” pursued Tubal Sims, in higher feather since they no longer dissimulated their absorption in these details. “He calls hisse’f a juggler, though his name is John Leonard.”
“What’s he live on?” demanded the sheriff.
“The money he made at his show. He ’lowed ter gin more shows, but the church folks gin it out ez he war in league with Satan, an’ threatened ter dump him in the ruver, so he quit jugglin’.”
The deputy with difficulty repressed a guffaw, but asked, with a keen curiosity, “Was it a pretty good show?”
“Ye never seen nuthin’ like it in yer life. He jes’”—
“What sort of lookin’ man is he?” interrupted the sheriff. He cast a glance at the deputy, who unobtrusively began to busy himself with pen, ink, and paper, and was presently scribbling briskly as Tubal Cain Sims sought to describe the stranger.
“He looks some like a mountain feller now,” he said. “He paid my wife ter make him some clothes; but shucks!” his eye kindling with the glow of discursive reminiscence, “the clothes he kem thar in war a sight fur the jay-birds,—leetle pants ez kem down no furder’n that, an’ long stockin’s like a gal’s, an’ no mo’ ’shamed of ’em ’n I am o’ my coat-collar; a striped black-an’-red coat he hed on, an’ long, p’inted reddish shoes.” He paused to laugh, while a glance of fiery excitement and significance shot from the eyes of one officer into those of the other.