“All right, Ma’am; I’ll see to that. It’s all a little mistake, sir,” he said amiably, as he turned to Stranleigh. “Accidents will happen in the best regulated family, as the saying goes,” and with a flourish of the hat he departed.
Miss Armstrong rose as if to leave the verandah. As she did so Stranleigh said in a tone of mild reproach:
“I confess I am puzzled.”
“So am I,” replied the girl, brightly. “I’m puzzled to know what I can offer you in the way of books. Our stock is rather limited.”
“I don’t want to read, Miss Armstrong, but I do want to know why there is such a prejudice here against a sheriff. In the land I came from a sheriff is not only regarded with great respect, but even with veneration. He rides about in a gilded coach, and wears magnificent robes, decorated with gold lace. I believe that he develops ultimately into a Lord Mayor, just as a grub, if one may call so glorious a personage as a sheriff a grub, ultimately becomes a butterfly. We’d never think of shooting a sheriff. Why, then, do you pot at sheriffs, and hit innocent people, out here?”
The girl laughed.
“I saw the Lord Mayor of London once in his carriage, and behind it were two most magnificent persons. Were they sheriffs?”
“Oh, dear no; they were merely flunkeys.”
“Our sheriffs are elected persons, drawn from the politician class, and if you know America, you will understand what that means. Among the various duties of a sheriff is that of seizing property and selling it, if the owner of that property hasn’t paid his debts.”
“They act as bailiffs, then?”