Corbin rose stiffly to his knees and, bending over, brushed off some dirt and dry leaves which clung to his trousers.
“How come ye here, Miss?” he demanded suspiciously.
Miriam’s first impulse was to decline to answer, but Corbin had stepped back from the grave and stood almost directly in front of her, blocking the footpath.
“I am out for a walk,” she replied, “and by chance came this way.”
“It’s lonesome like, for a lady.” Corbin hitched himself a trifle closer, a beam of admiration in his watery eyes, which Miriam found more objectionable than a glare of rage.
“What are you doing here, Corbin?” she asked, coolly taking the situation into her hands. “What interests you in these old graves?”
Corbin shifted uneasily from one foot to the other. “Getting some ivy,” he explained. “I wanted to plant some around the garage.”
“So you rob a grave—”
Corbin’s complexion turned an even more unhealthy color.
“Oh, the old suicide won’t miss it,” he said coarsely, and hastily changed the subject. “Funny, weren’t it, that Mr. Paul should ha’ left in his will this here graveyard to Mr. Alan, ’cause it belonged to his ancestors, and never given him nothin’ else, ’cept five hundred dollars.”