CHAPTER VII JUST A JEW When the cobbler was at work again, Virginia, after picking up a few nails and tacks scattered on the floor, sat down. "Would you like to hear something about me and Peggy, lassie?" he inquired, "an' will you take my word for things?" Jinnie nodded trustfully. She had already grown to love the cobbler, and her affection grew stronger as she stated: "There isn't anything you'd tell me, cobbler, I wouldn't believe!" With slow importance Lafe put down his hammer. "I'm a Israelite," he announced. "What's that?" asked the girl, immediately interested. The cobbler looked over his spectacles and smiled. "A Jew, just a plain Jew." "I don't know what a Jew is either," confessed Jinnie. Lafe groped for words to explain his meaning. "A Jew," he ventured presently, "is one of God's----chosen----folks. I mean one of them chose by Him to believe." "Believe what?" "All that God said would be," explained Lafe, reverently. "And you believe it, cobbler?" "Sure, kid; sure." The shoemaker saw a question mirrored in the depths of the violet eyes. "And thinking that way makes you happy, eh, Mr. Lafe? Does it make you smile the way you do at girls without homes?" As she put this question sincerely to him, Jinnie reminded the cobbler of a beautiful flower lifting its proud head to the sun. In his experience with young people, he had never seen a girl like this one. "It makes me happier'n anything!" he replied, cheerfully. "The wonderful part is I wouldn't know about it if I hadn't lost my legs. I'll tell you about it, lass." Jinnie settled back contentedly. "A long time ago," began Mr. Grandoken, "God led a bunch of Jews out of a town where a king was torturin' 'em----" The listener's eyes darkened in sympathy. "They was made to do a lot of things that hurt 'em; their babies and women, too." Jinnie leaned forward and covered the horny hand with her slender fingers. "Have you ever had any babies, Lafe?" she ventured. A perceptible shadow crossed the man's face. "Yes," said he hesitatingly. "Me and Peggy had a boy--a little fellow with curly hair--a Jew baby. Peggy always let me call him a Jew baby, though he was part Irish." "Oh!" gasped Jinnie, radiantly. "I was a big fellow then, kid, with fine, strong legs, an' nights, when I'd come home, I'd carry the little chap about." The cobbler's eyes glistened with the memory, but shadowed almost instantly. "But one day----" he hesitated. The pause brought an exclamation from the girl. "And one day--what?" she demanded. "He died; that's all," and Lafe gazed unseeingly at the snow-covered tracks. "And you buried him?" asked Virginia, softly. "Yes, an' the fault was mostly mine, Jinnie. I ain't had no way to make it up to Peggy, but there's lots of to-morrows." "You'll make her happy then?" ejaculated the girl. "Yes," said Lafe, "an' I might a done it then, but I wouldn't listen to the voices."