“What’d he ever do?” demanded the sheriff incredulously. And the deputy sat very still and silent. Now, the peculiarity of being literal-minded has special reference to exoteric phenomena introduced for mental contemplation, but is easily coexistent with the evolution of an esoteric train of ideas, the complication of which is nullified by familiarity incident to their production. The sheriff was a plain man, a serious-minded man, who could not see a joke when it was before his nose; so literal-minded a man that because he never perceived the latent scheme of another, he himself was never suspected of scheming. “What’d he ever do?” he repeated, and it did not occur to Tubal Cain Sims that he had not yet mentioned the juggler’s name, nor so much as suggested his own or the locality whence he came. “I ain’t keerin’ ter know _whut_ he done!” he asseverated, led on by the non-compliant look of the other. “I _know_ he done _somewhut_; an’ Phemie ain’t goin’ ter be ’lowed ter marry no evil-doer an’ crim’nal agin the law.” The pause that ensued was unbroken, while the thunder rolled anew, and the dashing of the water of the surly black creek at the foot of the hill came to their ears. The sunshine on the floor faded out suddenly and all at once, and the murky gray light was devoid of any lingering shimmer. If the deputy breathed, he did not hear the heaving of his own chest, so still he was. The sheriff, having allowed in vain a goodly margin for continuance, went on abruptly: “That’s the way you fellows, with no sense of the obligations of the law, carry on. You have got no information to give. You have got some personal motive, an’ that’s the way to get an officer into trouble,--false arrests an’ charges of stirrin’ up of strife an’ such like,--an’ it’s personal motive always. I’ll bet this man o’ yourn ain’t committed no crime,” and he turned his calm gray eyes on Tubal Cain Sims, seated in the midst of his consciousness of a fool errand to the great county town. Mortified pride surged to his face in a scarlet flood, and vehement argument rose to his lips. “Why can’t he sleep quiet nights in his bed, then?” he retorted. “Why do he holler out so pitiful, fit ter split yer heart, in his sleep. ‘What can I do? For his life!--his life!--his life! Oh, what can I do--for his life!--his life!--his life’?”