“That ain’t the way he thought about it—and me and gran’daddy, you know, we don’t want anything that ain’t sure ’nough ours; he said you could sell it for enough money to pay all you owed. He was plumb glad of it and now he’ll be mighty nigh as sorry as you and me is.” For a moment sad, silent thought held sway. “There’s one good thing about it though,” the child tucked his garment tightly under his knees, “you don’t get out without dressin’ yourself, the way I do; you ought to be glad about that. Gran’daddy says there’s always some good even in the baddest things if we watch out for it.” His companion made no response and the boy resumed his role of sympathizer. “I reckon you was borned that-a-way, jes’ like me, and it’s powerful mizzable to be borned with ways that you can’t help; and you ain’t got any Dixie to watch out for you. And Aunt Carliny, she makes me sleep with her and Jakey, so’s she can catch me at it, but I don’t guess you’ve got any Aunt Carliny either.” “Naw,” old man Sumter got up and reached for his lantern, “I ain’t got nary somebody that cares what becomes of me.” The boy got down off the log and pityingly took his hand. “Le’s go home,” he said, “I know where I be now an’ if you’re kind o’ mixed up yet, why I can show you the trail,” and he led away as shamefaced an old sinner as ever trod the mountains. (Seeing the pair on friendly terms, Dixie indulged in a brief interview with a ’possum.) “As I was a-sayin’,” comforted the child as they picked their way by the lantern’s light, “it’s powerful mizzable to be borned with ways that you can’t help; but don’t you go to takin’-on about it, for we’re bound to outgrow it—so gran’daddy says. And there’s another thing where you’re worse off than me: gran’daddy says you was borned mad at everybody all the time—that must be powerful mizzable too, but I reckon you’ll outgrow that too.” They parted at Sumter’s door and then Grover Cleveland and Dixie sped homeward. Noiselessly the little fellow entered the house, crept into bed beside his Aunt Carliny and straightway forgot his “mizzable” inheritance. But he had it embarrassingly recalled to his mind next morning at breakfast when Aunt Carliny said as she gave him his second helping of hominy: “Grover Cleveland’s getting right good ’bout stayin’ in bed o’ nights; he ain’t tried to get up in a dog’s age. Of course he couldn’t get up without my catchin’ him, for I’m always sleepin’ with one eye open, but seem like he don’t try any more.” “I reckon he’s outgrowin’ them kind of capers,” gran’daddy reached out, stroked the yellow pate and the yellow pate bent lower and lower and finally the whole boy went down under the table. He next appeared tagging dumbly at the heels of the old gentleman as he was making his morning tour among his stock, who, when a sudden turn brought them into collision, reached behind him and brought the boy out of his obscurity.