"A thirty-dollar coffin? No, no, undertaker! A five-dollar robe? No, no, undertaker! Four carriages? No, no, undertaker! Think you the living have no rights? Cold, rigid dignity will suffice the dead, but the living must have money. He was my father, and I am his heir; therefore, speedy forgetfulness for the one and luxury for the other. Five hundred dollars are upon his life. As four hundred and fifty slip through my fingers I'll remember I owe him something for dying a pauper. Twenty dollars will keep Patsy chewing starch; and you, undertaker, may have the rest, and the thanks of science for your services. Why gaze upon the dead? Think you how you can make it twenty? At twenty? At twenty, you say? Cigars, cigars, ten dollars for cigars. You can't? Out! Out! Out! Offend not the living by pitying the dead." Caleb thus addressed the undertaker while gazing upon the dead body of his father. As the undertaker left the room Patsy hobbled in upon her crutches, sat close to the corpse and sobbed aloud. "Why those tears, old woman?" asked Caleb. "Where is your heart, Caleb, my boy?" "In the twenty dollars you hold in your hand. Disgrace, and disgrace, and ever disgrace! The old man was a boaster in life and a pauper in death. Now you would spend for starch what I should spend for cigars. No more disgrace for the family, old woman. Eschew starch, bless your son, and hie you to the washtub." He took the money and arranged it in the shape of a cigar. Patsy looked lovingly at Caleb, and considered Rahab's offer to preach Benjamin's funeral sermon. On the day of Benjamin's funeral Rahab was present. Patsy gave him a chair close to the coffin. The people were so seated that egress was impossible. Leaning upon her crutches and gazing straight into Rahab's face, Patsy gave out, and the people sang: "A charge to keep I have, a God to glorify." Rahab looked at the corpse; and, seeing a sermon in the cold, rigid form, turned and looked at Patsy. "Beware of the immediate future," said she. Rahab trembled, stammered something, and looked at the ceiling. Patsy brought her crutch in close proximity to his head. Said she, keeping her crutch in motion and her eye in Rahab's: "Words of the dead to the dead avail little. Were it not for your presence there would be no funeral sermon. The man in the coffin is not dead, but sleeping. Why should we disturb his slumbers? You have just life enough to hear your doom. Why should we not pronounce it?" Rahab started to rise. Patsy moved her crutch, and the people sang: "That awful day will surely come." Rahab dropped back into his seat and looked wildly around the room. Patsy laid her hand gently upon his shoulder and said: "Rahab, Benjamin's blood is in part upon your hands. Caleb believed you when you said that God would curse him. After seeing your crimes he believed that God had cursed both. To be cursed, he thinks, gives the right to curse. Rahab, the Master is waiting and calling."