Mother.
A queer little man, that new grave-digger. He was digging a grave, as I was going to church this morning. I asked him whom it was for. “For whom God will,” says he, “perhaps for myself. I might have the same experience as my grandfather. He once had got an extra grave ready, and that night when he was going home from the inn, he fell in and broke his neck.”
Leonard (who has been reading the paper all the time).
The fellow doesn’t belong to this town; he can tell us any lies he likes.
Mother.
I asked him why he didn’t wait till there was an order for a grave. “I’m invited to a wedding to-day,” he said, “and I’m prophet enough to know that I shall feel it in my head to-morrow morning. Then somebody’s sure to have gone and died, just to spite me, and that would mean getting up early without finishing my sleep.”
Anthony.
“You fathead,” I’d have said, “what if the grave doesn’t fit?”
Mother.
That’s what I said. But he can shake out sharp answers as quick as the devil can shake out fleas. “I’ve made it to fit Weaver John,” says he, “he’s as big as King Saul, head and shoulders above everybody else. So anybody can come that likes—he won’t find his house too small for him. And if it’s too big, it’ll hurt no one but me. I’m an honourable man and won’t charge for an inch over the coffin-length.” I threw my flowers in, and said, “Now it’s occupied.”