“Never mind, Mother,” counseled Joe. “I’ll be all right. They have to do what they’re doing, I suppose.”
“Yes, they’re doin’ what that little snip-snapper with them colored whiskers tells ’em to do!” said she.
Solemn as the occasion was, a grin went round at the bald reference to a plainer fact. Even the dullest there had seen the grayish-red at the roots of the coroner’s beard. The coroner grew very red of face, and gave some orders to his stenographer, who wrote them down. He thanked the jurors and dismissed them. Bill Frost began to prepare for the journey to Shelbyville to turn Joe over to the sheriff.
The first, and most important, thing in the list of preliminaries for the journey, was the proper adjustment of Bill’s mustache. Bill roached it up with a turn of the forefinger, 148 using the back of it, which was rough, like a corn-cob. When he had got the ends elevated at a valiant angle, his hat firmly settled upon his head, and his suspenders tightened two inches, he touched Joe’s shoulder.
“Come on!” he ordered as gruffly and formally as he could draw his edged voice.
Joe stood, and Bill put his hand on his arm to pilot him, in all officiousness, out of the room. Mrs. Newbolt stepped in front of them as they approached.
“Joe!” she cried appealingly.
“That’s all right, Mother,” he comforted her, “everything will be cleared up and settled in a day or two. You go on home now, Mother, and look after things till I come.”
“Step out of the way, step out of the way!” said Bill with spreading impatience.
Mrs. Newbolt looked at the blustering official pityingly.