“You can’t have it.”
“Oh, dear!” Jehoshaphat sighed. “My, my! Pshaw! I ’low, then, us’ll just have t’ take it.”
Jehoshaphat went to the door of the shop. It was cold and gloomy in the shop. He opened the door. The public of Satan’s Trap, in the persons of ten men of the place, fathers of families (with the exception of Timothy Yule, who had qualified upon his expectations), trooped over the greasy floor, their breath cloudy in the frosty air, and crowded into the little office, in the wake of Jehoshaphat Rudd. They had the gravity of mien, the set faces, the compassionate eyes, the merciless purpose, of a jury. The shuffling subsided. It was once more quiet in the little office. Timothy Yule’s hatred got the better of his sense of propriety: he laughed, but the laugh expired suddenly, for Jehoshaphat Rudd’s hand fell with unmistakable meaning upon his shoulder.
John Wull faced them.
“I ’low, Mister Wull,” said Jehoshaphat, diffidently, “that we wants the storehouse key.”
The trader put the key in his pocket.
“The key,” Jehoshaphat objected; “we wants that there key.”
“By the Almighty!” old John Wull snarled, “you’ll all go t’ jail for this, if they’s a law in Newfoundland.”
The threat was ignored.
“Don’t hurt un, lads,” Jehoshaphat cautioned; “for he’s so wonderful tender. He’ve not been bred the way we was. He’s wonderful old an’ lean an’ brittle,” he added, gently; “so I ’low we’d best be careful.”