“For the third and last time, who told you?” demanded Grant.
“Petersen told me.”
“You’ve been talking to the Finn, have you?” exclaimed Fred.
“Yes, and he’s a nice fellow, too.”
“Maybe you’ll get his hard luck away from him,” laughed Grant.
“I guess he’s had hard luck himself all right,” said Pop seriously. “That doesn’t mean he’ll give it to others though.”
“What hard luck has he had?” asked John.
“Well, his father died when he was a baby and he was left with a big family of children to be brought up by his mother. She had no money and of course had an awfully hard time of it. Two of his sisters died of scarlet fever, a younger brother was drowned and finally his mother got pneumonia and she died. I call that pretty tough luck myself.”
“So do I,” agreed Grant readily.
“If Sam heard all those things he’d surely say it was because it was a family of Finns,” said Fred. “He’d say they brought hard luck to one another.”