“Harry will have his little fun, you see.”

[Illustration:  THE SHERIFF IS MAD]

“He is a somewhat exuberant humorist,” I replied.  “What was the object of the joke?”

“Well, he’s going to sell his furniture at auction, and I promised to notice the fact in to-day’s Patriot, but I forgot it, and he called to remind me of it.”

“Do all of your friends refresh your memory in that vivid manner?  If I’d been in your place, I’d have knocked him down.”

“No, you wouldn’t,” said Slott—­“no, you wouldn’t.  Harry is the sheriff, and he controls two thousand dollars’ worth of official advertising.  I’d sooner he’d kick me from here to Borneo and back again than to take that advertising away from the Patriot.  What are a few bumps and a sore shin or two compared with all that fatness?  No, sir; he can have all the fun he wants out of me.”

The next visitor was less demonstrative.  He was tall and slender and clad in the habiliments of woe.  He entered the office and took a chair.  Removing his hat, he wiped the moisture from his eyes, rubbed his nose thoughtfully for a moment, put his handkerchief in his hat, his hat upon the floor, and said,

“You didn’t know Mrs. Smith?”

“I hadn’t that pleasure.  Who was she?”

“She was my wife.  She’s been sick some time.  But day before yesterday she was took worse, and she kep’ on sinking until evening, when she gave a kinder sudden jump a couple of times, and then her spirit flickered.  Dead, you know.  Passed away into another world.”

“I’m very sorry.”

“So am I. And I called around to see if I couldn’t get some of you literary people to get out some kind of a poem describing her peculiarities, so that I can advertise her in the paper.”

“I dunno; maybe we might.”

[Illustration:  MR. SMITH’S GRIEF]

“Oh, you didn’t know her, you say?  Well, she was a sing’lar kinder woman.  Had strong characteristics.  Her nose was the crookedest in the State—­all bent around sideways.  Old Captain Binder used to say that it looked like the jibsail of an oyster-sloop on the windward tack.  Only his fun, you know.  But Helen never minded it.  She said herself that it aimed so much around the corner that whenever she sneezed she blew down her back hair.  There were rich depths of humor in that woman.  Now, I don’t mind if you work into the poem some picturesque allusion to the condition of her nose, so her friends will recognize her.  And you might also spend a verse or two on her defective eye.”

“What was the matter with her eye?”