Page:Arthur Stringer-The Loom of Destiny.djvu/123

The Essentials of Aristocracy about—about—well, about three dollars a bottle."

"H'gh! What's that! When my ma gets one of her spells it's just awful. She shakes so hard someone has to hold her in bed!"

Again Johnnie snorted his contempt.

"The doctor told my Aunt Martha my mother was going to cough herself to pieces, and that she might die any single day."

That rather staggered Jimmie Carson. A voice back in the crowd said, "Hurrah for Johnnie!" and the new boy's chest swelled with the old pride.

"And she can't ever get better," went on the exultant Johnnie. "And I'll ride in a cab, see, same as I did at grandpa's funeral!"

The enemy recovered himself. "Oh, ridin' in a cab ain't nothin'. I watched my grandpa die! And Uncle Jake was killed, too. He was a fireman, and they brought him home on a board, after a wall fell right over on top of him, and he was all bleedin' terrible, and smashed up!"

A well-merited cheer from the circle 111