on't you remember? It's an old nursery rhyme; probably you heard it
hundreds of times when you were a little boy:

"Old King Cole was a merry old soul
And a merry old soul was he.
He called for his pipe and he called for his bowl,
And he called for his fiddlers three."

The coal magnate threw back his head on the pillows and laughed long and
loud. He laughed until he grew purple and gasped for breath, and he
laughed while he choked, and Sheila flew about for stimulants. For a few
breathless moments Sheila thought she had whipped up the hearse--to use
the mammoth man's own metaphor--but after a panting half-hour the heart
subsided and the breath came easier.

"You nearly did for me that time, boss. But it fits; Jehoshaphat, it fits
me like a B. V. D.! The only difference you might put down to simplified
spelling. Eh?" And he cautiously chuckled at his joke.

While Sheila was making ready for the night he chuckled and lapsed into
florid, heliotrope studies by turns. "It's straight, what I told you about
being a sinner," he gave verbal expression to his thoughts at last.
"That's why I don't leave a cent to charity--not a cent. Ain't going to
have any peaked-faced, oily-tongued jackasses saying over my coffin that I
tried to buy my entrance ticket into the Lord Almighty's kingdom. No,
sirree! I know I've lived high, eaten well, and drunk some. I've made the
best of every good bargain that came within eyeshot. I treated my own
handsome--and I let the rest of the world go hang. Went to church Easter
Sunday every year and put a bill in the plate; you can figure for yourself
about how much I've given to charity. Never had any time to think of it,
anyway--probably wouldn't have given if I had. Always thought Mother'd
live longer'n me and she'd take care of that end of it. But she didn't."

For a moment Sheila thought the man was going to cry; his lower lip
quivered like a baby's, and his eyes grew red and watery. There was no
denying it, the man was a caricature; even his grief was ludicrous. He
wiped his eyes with the back of his heliotrope sleeve and finished what he
had to say. "Don't it beat all how the pious vultures croak over you the
minute you're done for--reminding you you can't take your money away with
you? Didn't the parson--first time he came--sit in that chair and open up
and begin about the rich man's squeezing through a needle's eye and a lot
about putting away temporal stuff? I don't aim to do an