THE news was all over town in two minutes, and you could see the people
tearing down on the run from every which way, some of them putting on
their coats as they come. Pretty soon we was in the middle of a crowd,
and the noise of the tramping was like a soldier march. The windows and
dooryards was full; and every minute somebody would say, over a fence:

"Is it THEM?"

And somebody trotting along with the gang would answer back and say:

"You bet it is."

When we got to the house the street in front of it was packed, and the
three girls was standing in the door. Mary Jane WAS red-headed, but that
don't make no difference, she was most awful beautiful, and her face and
her eyes was all lit up like glory, she was so glad her uncles was come.
The king he spread his arms, and Mary Jane she jumped for them, and the
hare-lip jumped for the duke, and there they HAD it! Everybody most,
leastways women, cried for joy to see them meet again at last and have
such good times.

Then the king he hunched the duke private--I see him do it--and then he
looked around and see the coffin, over in the corner on two chairs; so
then him and the duke, with a hand across each other's shoulder, and
t'other hand to their eyes, walked slow and solemn over there, everybody
dropping back to give them room, and all the talk and noise stopping,
people saying "Sh!" and all the men taking their hats off and drooping
their heads, so you could a heard a pin fall. And when they got there
they bent over and looked in the coffin, and took one sight, and then
they bust out a-crying so you could a heard them to Orleans, most; and
then they put their arms around each other's necks, and hung their chins
over each other's shoulders; and then for three minutes, or maybe four, I
never see two men leak the way they done. And, mind you, everybody was
doing the same; and the place was that damp I never see anything like it.
Then one of them got on one side of the coffin, and t'other on t'other
side, and they kneeled down and rested their foreheads on the coffin, and
let on to pray all to themselves. Well, when it come to that it worked
the crowd like you never see anything like it, and everybody broke down
and went to sobbing right out loud--the poor girls, too; and every woman,
nearly, went up to the girls, without saying a word, and kissed them,
solemn, on the forehead, and then put their hand on their head, and
looked up towards the sky, with the tears r