We Lose A Friend

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"I wonder if it would be right to say 'ashes to ashes and dust to dust,'" said Peter.

"No, it wouldn't," averred Felicity. "It would be real wicked."

"I think we ought to sing a hymn, anyway," asseverated Sara Ray.

"Well, we might do that, if it isn't a very religious one," conceded Felicity.

"How would 'Pull for the shore, sailor, pull for the shore,' do?" asked Cecily. "That never seemed to me a very religious hymn."

"But it doesn't seem very appropriate to a funeral occasion either," said Felicity.

"I think 'Lead, kindly light,' would be ever so much more suitable," suggested Sara Ray, "and it is kind of soothing and melancholy too."

"We are not going to sing anything," said the Story Girl coldly. "Do you want to make the affair ridiculous? We will just fill up the grave quietly and put a flat stone over the top."

"It isn't much like my idea of a funeral," muttered Sara Ray discontentedly.

"Never mind, we're going to have a real obituary about him in Our Magazine," whispered Cecily consolingly.

"And Peter is going to cut his name on top of the stone," added Felicity. "Only we mustn't let on to the grown-ups until it is done, because they might say it wasn't right."

We left the orchard, a sober little band, with the wind of the gray twilight blowing round us. Uncle Roger passed us at the gate.

"So the last sad obsequies are over?" he remarked with a grin.

And we hated Uncle Roger. But we loved Uncle Blair because he said quietly,

"And so you've buried your little comrade?"

So much may depend on the way a thing is said. But not even Uncle Blair's sympathy could take the sting out of the fact that there was no Paddy to get the froth that night at milking time. Felicity cried bitterly all the time she was straining the milk. Many human beings have gone to their graves unattended by as much real regret as followed that one gray pussy cat to his.