"There's the clock," he said, pointing to it where it lay on the
counter. Abner took it up and put it under his arm, saying:
"David 'll be 'bliged to ye, Squire, when I tell him how cheerful ye
sent it back. Some o' the fellers," he pursued with an affectation of
a confidential tone, "some o' the fellers said mebbe ye wouldn't send
it back cheerful. They said ye'd got no more compassion fer the poor
than a flint stun. They said, them fellers did, that ye'd never in yer
life let up on a man as owed ye, an would take a feller's last drop o'
blood sooner'n lose a penny debt. They said, them fellers did, that
yer hands, wite ez they looks, wuz red with the blood o' them that
ye'd sent to die in jail."
Abner's voice had risen to a tremendous crescendo of indignation, and
he seemed on the point of quite forgetting his ironical affectation,
when, with an effort which added to the effect, he checked himself and
resuming his former tone and grin, he added:
"I argyed with them fellers ez said them things bout ye. I tole em
haow it couldn't be so, caze ye wuz a deakin, an hed family prayers,
and could pray mos' ez long ez parson. But I couldn't do nothin with
em, they wuz so sot.
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