The greatness in the middle chair emitted a grunt.
“Humph!” he muttered, and again, “Hr-m-m-ph!”
“It would be surprising,” conceded the middle-aged man, “after all these years.”
“Considerable many of th’ creditors has died since,” piped up a lean youth who was smoking a very large cigar. “I s’pose th’ children of all such would come in for their share—eh, Judge?”
Judge Fulsom frowned and pursed his lips thoughtfully.
“The proceedings has not yet reached the point you mention, Henry,” he said. “You’re going a little too fast.”
Nobody spoke, but the growing excitement took the form of a shuffling of feet. The Judge deliberately lighted his pipe, a token of mental relaxation. Then from out the haze of blue smoke, like the voice of an oracle from the seclusion of a shrine, issued the familiar recitative tone for which everybody had been waiting.
“Well, boys, I’ll tell you how ’twas: Along about ten minutes of twelve I had my hat on my head, and was just drawing on my linen duster with the idea of going home to dinner, when I happened to look out of my office window, and there was Deacon Whittle—and the girl, just coming up th’ steps. In five minutes more I’d have been gone, most likely for the day.”
“Gosh!” breathed the excitable young farmer.
The middle-aged man sternly motioned him to keep silence.