asked him if he couldn't
take the tail off, but he said 't that would hurt his reputation. He
said 'f I'd go up the ladder to his second floor 'n' look down on the
lion I'd never talk about sawin' off his tail, 'n' he said 't anyhow
cuttin' it off would only make it cost more because it was cut on in
the first place. I saw the sense o' that, 'n' I remembered, too, 't
even 'f folks in the cemetery never can see the tail, father 'll have
to look at it from higher up 'n the ladder to the monument man's shed,
'n' I don't want him to think 't I economized on the tail of his
tombstone. I tell you what, Mrs. Lathrop, I cert'nly do want that
lion, but I can't have it, so I've decided not to think of it again.
The man c'd see I wanted it, 'n' I c'd see 't he really wanted me to
have it. He felt so kind o' sorry for me 't he said he'd do me a
weepin' fox for one hunderd 'n' fifty, if I wanted it, but I didn't
want no fox. Father didn't have nothin' like a fox--his nose was broad
'n' kind o' flat. He hadn't nothin' like a lion, neither, but I'd like
to have the only lion in the cemetery ours."

Mrs. Lathrop nodded her head sympathetically.

Miss Clegg sighed and looked pensive for a moment, but it was soon
over.

"'N' I've decided about my child too," she continued briskly,--"I've
decided to have a boy. I decided goin' in on the train to-day. I'd
been sorter thinkin' that I'd leave it to chance, but ordinary folks
can't do no more 'n' that, 'n' where 's the good o' me bein' so open
'n' above-board 'f I dunno whether it'll be a boy or girl, after all?
I might 's well 's married the minister, 'n' Lord knows Mrs. Shores's
troubles ought to be warnin' enough to no woman in this community not
to marry no man, f'r one while, at any rate. If Mrs. Shores hadn't
married Mr. Shores, she c'd easy 'a' married his clerk when she fell
in love with him. No woman that 's goin' to fall in love ever ought to
begin by marryin' another man first. It mixes everythin' all up. But
Mrs. Shores was a fool or she never would 'a' married him to begin
with. I told him that the first time 't I see him after she was gone.
I thought 't if it was any comfort to him to know that there was one
person in the c'mmunity 't looked on his wife as a fool he was welcome
to the knowin'. So I told him, 'n' I used those very self-same words
too,--'n' I cert'nly did ache to tell him that he was jus' 's big a
fool himself to 'a' ever married her, but I didn't think 't tha