“You uns knowd Hen Wheedle?” he inquired.
“He was afore my time but I’ve heard o’ him,” replied the Miller.
The Chronic Loafer looked up from the steps, where he had been sitting, whittling a piece of soft white pine.
“I s’posn you’ve heard o’ Bill Siler?” he asked, in a pleasant, alluring tone.
“Bill Siler,” repeated the Miller. He laid his forefinger against his forehead and thought a minute. “I think I hev. His name’s wery famil’ar. But why did ye ast?”
“Oh, jest because I’ve noticed that most everybody was afore your time an’ you’ve heard o’ ’em. I never knowd Bill Siler. His name was jest ginirated in my head, an’ I thot ye might tell me who he was.”
“You thot ye’d ketch me, heigh,” cried the other. “Ye thot ye’d be smart an’——”
“Boys, boys,” the Patriarch shook his stick at his companions. “Don’t quarrel—don’t. Mebbe some day one o’ ye’ll go over the mo’ntain an’ then every mean word ye ever sayd’ll come back. Mean words is like them wooden balls on a ’lastic string that they sells the children at the county fair. The harder they is an’ the wiolenter ye th’ow ’em the quicker they bounces home to ye an’ the more they hurt. I otter know. Hen Wheedle otter know. Why every time he thinks o’ me his conscience must jest roll around inside o’ him.” The light in the old man’s pipe had gone out. He applied a sulphur match to it and sneezed violently. “But I’ve forgot the wrong Hen done me. He must ’a’ suffered innardly fer it. Ef he ever returns I’ll put this right hand in hisn an’ say, ’Hen, you done wrong, but you’ve suffered innardly an’ I fergive ye.’ They’s a heap o’ difference ’tween plain, ord’nary sufferin’ inside o’ ye, an’ sufferin’ innardly. Fer the first ye takes bitters, stops smokin’ an’ in a day you’re all right. But ’hen the conscience gits out o’ order all the bitters in the world an’ all the stoppin’ smokin’ in creation’ll give ye no ease. That’s what I sais, an’ I otter know, fer I can jest see how Hen Wheedle feels.”
No sulphurous fume was blazing around the Patriarch’s nose, but he sneezed again and choked himself with a piece of canton-flannel that served him as a handkerchief.