Just outside the rear of his sleeping quarters ran the wire
right-of-way fence, which was also the back fence of a small piece of
property on which stood a rickety old house. The house was devoid of
paint, but it was a cheerful sight from where Chi Foxy reclined. He
had a clear view of the kitchen window, from which the light came in a
yellow glow, and he could see a woman cooking something in a
frying-pan on a kitchen stove. A man sat beside the stove, his elbows
on his knees, waiting for supper.
Chi Foxy almost decided to climb the fence and knock at the door of
the kitchen at the moment the woman took the frying-pan off the stove,
but he was feeling well filled and comfortable, and he decided to wait
and to use the house as his breakfasting-place. This required no
little strength of character, for the perfume of fried veal chops was
wafted to his nostrils, but he held himself in hand, and when he had
burned his pipeful of tobacco he curled down and went to sleep.
He was awakened by the sound of voices near at hand, and peered out
between the ties. The night was not dark. The voices had come from a
man and a woman, and as Chi Foxy watched them the man began digging in
the sandy soil with a spade. He made quite a hole in the soil and
turned to the woman.
"Hand me the bag," he said.
The woman dragged a heavy gunny-sack to the edge of the hole. The man
untwisted the neck of the bag and up-ended it over the hole. There
followed the rattle of bones, one striking against the other, and the
man handed the bag back to the woman. Chi Foxy peered eagerly at the
hole. He saw bones. He looked up at the stars and saw it must be well
after midnight. He saw the man hastily spade the soft soil over the
bones, saw him scatter loose dry top-sand over the completed job, and
saw the man and woman hurry back to the dark house.
The next morning Chi Foxy left his resting-place and climbed over the
wire fence. He looked curiously at the spot where the weird burial had
taken place, and went on toward the house. He knocked on the door, and
it was opened by the man--a tall, lanky, coarse-bearded specimen.
"Say, friend, how about givin' a feller some breakfast?" asked Chi
Foxy.
"How 'bout it, ma?" asked the man, turning his head. "Got some
breakfast for this feller?"
The woman looked toward the tramp. She evidently decided in his favor.
"Let him set on the step and I kin hand him out some coffee and some
meat, if that'll do him," she said, and Chi Foxy seated himself. The
breakfast she brought him on a chipped plate was all he could have
desired. There was a half of a veal cutlet, browned to a nicety, a
portion of fried potatoes, a thick slice of bread without butter, and
a cup of coffee. Chi Foxy ate and drank.
"Thanks, folks," he said. "I won't forgit you." And he continued on
his way toward Riverbank.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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