“I live up there; and Sam, he—why he’s in the grave, and dam the man that moves his bones.”
Miss Schofield had been unprepared for this. Her emotion, however, was mistaken by Peanut for incredulity. “I can show it to you on the board,” he insisted, eagerly.
The woman came up close, now, and followed where his wisp of a finger pointed. As he indicated each line, he repeated it with a sort of monotonous tenderness, laying special emphasis on the last.
“Here lies the body of Blazer Sam,
For life he didn’t care a dam—
He was plugged by a greaser unbeknowns,
And dam the man that moves his bones.”
Miss Schofield’s look of concern became one of sympathetic understanding. The waif turned to her.
“You didn’t want to take Sam away, anyhow, did you?”
“Oh, no indeed! I don’t want to take any one away—” She hesitated and looked down into the wistful face before her. “At least, not Sam,” she qualified. “I have already taken a picture of the grave and you shall have one of them. Tell me, Philip, whom you live with, so I shall know how to send it.”