CHAPTER XIIt hit me bad. You wouldn’t believe how mighty awful bad it did hit me. I’ve seen growed up men, strong and all that, get hurt so bad, that they cried—and there’s nothing much worse than that—but somehow this kid had seemed more stronger than any man. There was so much sap in him, so much sassiness, and meanness, and go to him, that I couldn’t imagine him breaking down; not if there was a whole battery of guns turned loose and looking him right in the eye.
However, there he was, sitting with his head down, and his whole skinny little body shaking with sobs. It flabbergasted me. I called from the window! “Kid, it’s time to go!”
He leaped from that table as though a bullet had gone through him: a bullet of joy, I should say, because all at once he was smiling through the tears. H
