"Angie would have loved this ride! She was always hatin' the rich for ridin' when she couldn't."
"There ain't a trust company in town can beat my carriages. I got a fifty-dollar, one-carriage funeral here that can't be beat."
"Everything is surely fine, Mr. Lux."
"Lemme cover your knees with this rug, missy. We have one in all the carriages. You look real worn out, poor little missy. It's a sad day for you. Here, sit over on this side—it's quit rainin' now, and I'll open the window."
The miles lengthened between them and the city, the horses were mud-splashed to their flanks. They turned into a gravel way and up an incline of drive. At its summit the white monuments of the dead spread in an extensive city before them—a calm city, with an occasional cross standing boldly against the sky.
"Lots of these were my funerals," explained Mr. Lux. "That granite block over there—this marble-base column. I buried old man Snift of the Bronx last July. They've been four Lux funerals in that family the past two years. His cross over there's the whitest Carrara in this yard."
Tillie turned her little tear-ravaged face toward the window, but her eyes were heavy and without life.
"I—I don't know what I'd do if you wasn't along, Mr. Lux. I—I'm scared."
"I'm here—don't you worry. Don't you worry. I'm just afraid that little lightweight jacket ain't warm enough."
"I got a heavier one; but this is mournin', and it's all I got in black."