“You shall have Jim’s!” she cried passionately. “Now I know why I didn’t burn it up!”
The brown eyes of Doodles grew big with horror. “Burn it up?” he breathed.
“Yes,” she replied wearily, “I didn’t want anybody to have it—I was afraid Somerby’d get hold of it. Don’t you ever let Somerby have it!” she burst out fiercely. “No matter what he says, don’t you let him have it! Promise me that, promise me that!”
“No, I won’t let anybody have it—ever!” Doodles said earnestly.
She seemed satisfied, and went on. “It’s a comfort to think that’s settled. It’s worried me about Jim’s fiddle. I’m glad you’re going to have it—you’ll love it! I wanted to give you something for singing to me so beautifully. It is good of you to come. There’s nothing else in the trunk of any value, but you can have all there is. It is a nice fiddle—I don’t know how much it cost, but a lot of money—my, how Jim idolized it!”
“I had an Uncle Jim once,” said Doodles; but she did not heed.
“You’d better take the trunk right upstairs now,” she went on hurriedly. “Nobody’ll need it—there’s money enough under my pillow. I’ve saved plenty—oh, if I could only have kept on a little longer, I’d have had enough to take me home—I did want to lie side o’ Jim and the baby!”
The cough seized her again, and the paroxysm was so violent that Blue took fright and ran up to see if his mother had come home. But the kitchen was empty, and Granny, too, was nowhere to be found.
When he returned, the woman was talking—a strange medley of words which the boys could not piece together to make anything understandable.
Suddenly she burst into a gay little song, for a moment her voice rising full and strong, and then dropping into weak huskiness. Spent with the effort, she lay quiet for a little, but was soon singing again, sacred strains and ragtime ditties running in and out of one another in startling confusion.