im. Amen."

"Don't let any chair hurt my beautiful cobbler," wailed Bobbie, in a
new paroxysm of grief. "Gimme Lafe an' my stars."

In another instant Peggy staggered out of the room, leaving the blind
boy and Jinnie alone.

As the door closed, Bobbie's voice rose in louder appeal. Happy Pete
touched him tenderly with a cold, wet nose, crawling into his arms
with a little whine.

Jinnie looked at her two charges hopelessly. She knew not how to
comfort them, nor could she frame words that would still the agony of
the child. Yet she lifted Bobbie and Happy Pete and sat down with them
on her lap.

"Don't cry, honey," she stammered. "There! There! Jinnie'll rock
you."

Her face was ashen with anxiety, and perspiration stood in large drops
upon her brow. Mechanically she drew her sleeve across her face.

"I'm going to ask you to be awful good, Bobbie," she pleaded
presently. "Lafe's being arrested is hard on Peg--and she's sick."

Bobbie burst in on her words.

"But they'll sit my cobbler in a wicked chair, and kill him, Jinnie.
Peggy said they would."

"You remember, Bobbie," soothed the girl, "what Lafe said about God's
angels, don't you?"

The yellow head bent forward in assent.

"And how they're stronger'n a whole bunch of men?"

"Yes," breathed Bobbie; "but the chair--the men've got that, an' mebbe
the angels'll be busy when they're puttin' the cobbler in it."

This idea made him shriek out louder than before: "They'll kill Lafe!
Oh, Jinnie, they will!"

"They can't!" denied Jinnie, rigidly. "They can't! Listen, Bobbie."

The wan, unsmiling blind face brought the girl's lips hard upon it.

"I want to know all about the death chair," he whimpered stubbornly.

"Bobbie," she breathed, "will you believe me if I tell you about it?"

"Yes," promised Bobbie, snuggling nearer.

"Hang on to Pete, and I will tell you," said Jinnie.

"I'm hangin' to 'im," sighed Bobbie, touching Pete's shaggy forelock.
"Tell me about the chair."

Jinnie was searching her brain for an argument to satisfy him. She
wouldn't have lied for her own welfare--but for Bobbie--she could
feel the weak, small heart palpitating against her arm.

"Well, in the first place," she began deliberately, "Peg doesn't know
everything about murders. Why, Bobbie, they don't do anything at all
to men like Lafe. Why, a cobbler, dear, a cobbler could kill everybody
in the whole world if he liked."

Bobbie's breath was sent out in one long excl