"Is—Ann—here?" he whispered faintly.
"Yes, Dear, I am here, right close beside you. Can't you feel my hands?"
His head turned feebly, and his fingers sought hers.
"I have been—wretchedly—wicked!"
His voice was so low that Horace did not catch the words; but Scraggy heard, and crawled from Lem to Miss Shellington's side.
"Missus, will ye tell my little boy-brat that his mammy be here? Will ye say as how I loved him—him and Lemmy, allers?"
Her haggard face was close to Ann's, and the latter took in every word of the low-spoken petition. Miss Shellington bent over the dying man.
"Everett," she said brokenly, "your own mother is here, and she wants you to speak to her."
Brimbecomb partly rose, and, in scanning those in the hut, his eyes fell upon Screech Owl. The tense agony seemed for an instant to leave his face, and it fell into more boyish lines.
"Little 'un—pretty little 'un," whispered Scraggy "yer mammy loves ye, and Lemmy loved ye, too, if he did hit ye!"