Tell her that the cattle 'll all be hers--an'--the house, an' I ain't
got no one but--"
But Pierre pushed him back and shut the door, saying: "I'll tell her what
a fool you are, Jimmy Throng." The old man, as he sat down awkwardly in
his chair, with Duc stolidly lighting his pipe and watching him, said to
himself: "Yes, I be a durn fool; I be, I be!" over and over again. And
when the dog got up from near the stove and came near to him, he added:
"I be, Touser; I be a durn fool, for I ought to ha' stole two or three,
an' then I'd not be alone, an' nothin' but sour bread an' pork to eat.
I ought to ha' stole three."
"Ah, Manette ought to have given you some of your own, it's true, that!"
said Duc stolidly. "You never was a real father, Jim."
"Liddy got to look like me; she got to look like Manette and me, I tell
ye!" said the old man hoarsely. Duc laughed in his stupid way. "Look
like you? Look like you, Jim, with a face to turn milk sour? Ho, ho!"
Throng rose, his face purple with anger, and made as if to catch Duc by
the throat, but a fit of coughing seized him, and presently blood showed
on his lips. Duc, with a rough gentleness, wiped off the blood and put
the whisky-and-herbs to the sick man's lips, saying, in a fatherly way:
"For why you do like that? You're a fool, Jimmy!"
"I be, I be," said the old man in a whisper, and let his hand rest on
Duc's shoulder.
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