me more than I can tell, for I could not but feel that
it was a mistake. I was sure that the effect would be deleterious upon
my poor departed friend. Thompson--the expressman's name was Thompson,
as I found out in the course of the night--now went poking around his
car, stopping up whatever stray cracks he could find, remarking that
it didn't make any difference what kind of a night it was outside,
he calculated to make us comfortable, anyway. I said nothing, but I
believed he was not choosing the right way. Meantime he was humming to
himself just as before; and meantime, too, the stove was getting hotter
and hotter, and the place closer and closer. I felt myself growing pale
and qualmish, but grieved in silence and said nothing.

Soon I noticed that the "Sweet By and By" was gradually fading out; next
it ceased altogether, and there was an ominous stillness. After a few
moments Thompson said,

"Pfew! I reckon it ain't no cinnamon 't I've loaded up thish-yer stove
with!"

He gasped once or twice, then moved toward the cof--gun-box, stood over
that Limburger cheese part of a moment, then came back and sat down near
me, looking a good deal impressed. After a contemplative pause, he said,
indicating the box with a gesture,

"Friend of yourn?"

"Yes," I said with a sigh.

"He's pretty ripe, ain't he!"

Nothing further was said for perhaps a couple of minutes, each being
busy with his own thoughts; then Thompson said, in a low, awed voice,

"Sometimes it's uncertain whether they're really gone or not,--seem
gone, you know--body warm, joints limber--and so, although you think
they're gone, you don't really know. I've had cases in my car. It's
perfectly awful, becuz you don't know what minute they'll rise up and
look at you!" Then, after a pause, and slightly lifting his elbow toward
the box,--"But he ain't in no trance! No, sir, I go bail for him!"

We sat some time, in meditative silence, listening to the wind and the
roar of the train; then Thompson said, with a good deal of feeling,

"Well-a-well, we've all got to go, they ain't no getting around it. Man
that is born of woman is of few days and far between, as Scriptur' says.
Yes, you look at it any way you want to, it's awful solemn and cur'us:
they ain't nobody can get around it; all's got to go--just everybody, as
you may say. One day you're hearty and strong"--here he scrambled to his
feet and broke a pane and stretched his nose out at it a moment or two,