Golden Stories Part 31

"You're sure you _will_ get a profit?" she asked.

"You ask anyone round here about me," I said. "They'll soon tell you that I look out sharp for that. They'll look very nice when they're framed; and I make a good bit out of the frames, you see. Now about this ditty-box. I've got on the track of one that might turn out right; but there's a difficulty that I'd like to put to you. Suppose that there's no money in it, only a clue to where your father hid it. Wouldn't that be likely to be somewhere where you can't get at it? On board his s.h.i.+p, for example? Or in your old house?

"If it's in the house," she said, "I could get in. At least it was empty a week ago. Mother heard from an old neighbor. But perhaps it would be better to get someone else to go, and say that they wanted to look at the house?" She glanced at me doubtfully.

"You mean me?" She nodded slowly. "You are afraid that I might keep some of it?"

She stared at me in sheer amazement.

"Why, of course not!" she cried. "I was only thinking that it was a long way to ask you to go; and that I must not impose on your kindness."

"Give me the address," I said, "in case I should want it any time."

She gave me an address in Andeville. Then I changed the subject. I walked part of the way home with her. Then I had my dinner and went off to Andeville.

It was about an hour by train. By the time that I had found the agent and got the key it was growing dusk. I was some time arguing with him, because he wanted to send a man with me to lock up afterward. "We've had tramps get in several times," he explained, "and they've done a lot of damage; torn up the flooring and such senseless mischief." It occurred to me directly that the tramps were some of the men who had come after the ditty-box.

I persuaded him at last that I'd lock up all right and he let me go alone. I soon spotted what would be the best bedroom. I fumbled up the chimney and lit a match or two, and found a heavy canvas bag and a smaller one that rustled like notes. I was just looking for the last time when I heard soft steps behind me. I glanced round and saw two men before the match flickered out. The light caught the face of the foremost. It was the old man with the goat's beard. Then I was struck on the head and knocked senseless.

It was about six when I came to and lit another match and looked at my watch. The bags were gone, of course. I never saw them again or the two men. It was as well for them I didn't!

It was no use telling the agent or anybody. I never thought about that, only what I was to do about the girl and her mother. I didn't think very much about the mother, if you come to that. It seemed to me that I'd made a mess of it and lost their money, and I couldn't bear to think of the girl's disappointment. What upset me most was that I knew she'd believe every word of my story, and never dream that I'd taken the money myself, as some people would. She was such a trusting little thing, and--well, I may as well own up that I liked her. If I hadn't been fifteen years older than she was, and felt sure that she'd never look at a Jew--and a much rougher chap then than I am now--I should have had serious thoughts of courting her. And so--well, I knew that a hundred pounds was what they hoped for; and it didn't make very much odds to me.

I took out the paper that night and put in twenty five-pound notes, and did it up again. A bit of folly that you wouldn't have suspected me of, eh? Then you think me a bigger fool than most people do! At the same time, it was only fair and honest. I'd had her money and lost it, you see.

I was going to take the chest to their lodgings in a cab the next morning, but she called in early to ask if I had found it. I had an unhappy sort of feeling when I saw her come smiling into the shop, thinking that she wouldn't need to come any more. It's queer how a man feels over a little slip of a girl when he's knocked about all over the world and known hundreds of women and thought nothing of them!

I'd carried it down into this room, and I took her in and showed it.

Her delight was pretty to see. She fidgeted about at my elbow like a child while I was taking the corners off; and when she saw the notes she danced and clapped her hands; and when I gave them to her she sat down and hugged them and laughed and cried.

"If you knew how poor we've been!" she said, wiping her eyes. "How lonely and worried and miserable! Your kindness has been the only nice thing ever since father died. Twenty times five! That's a hundred.

They're real notes aren't they? I haven't seen one for ages."

"They're real enough," I told her. "I'll give you gold for them, if you like."

"I'd rather have their very selves," she said with a laugh. She studied one carefully; and suddenly she dropped them with a cry and sprang to her feet. Her face had gone white.

"Mr. Levy!" she cried. "Oh, Mr. Levy! _You put them there!_"

I told her a lie right out; and I'm not ashamed of it. I was a hard man of business, I said; and a Jew; and she was a silly sentimental child, or she'd never take such an idea into her head; and she needn't suppose I kept my shop for charity, and she'd know better when she was older.

She heard me out. Then she put her hand on my shoulder.

"Dear kind friend," she said, "father died in May this year. The note that I looked at was dated in June!" And I stood and stared at her like a fool. I suppose I looked a bit cut up, for she stroked my arm gently.

"You dear, good fellow!" she said. She seemed to have grown from a child into a woman in a few minutes. "I can't take them, but it will help me to be a better girl, to have known someone like you!"

"Like me!" I said, and laughed. "I'm just--just a rough, money-grubbing Jew. That's all I am."

She shook her head like mad.

"You may say what you like," she told me; "but you can't alter what I think. You're good--good--good!"

Then I told her just what had happened.

"So, you see, you owe me nothing," I wound up.

She wiped her eyes and took hold of me by the sleeve.

"I will tell you what I owe you," she said. "Food when I was hungry; kindness when I was wretched; your time, your care--yes, and the risk of your life. If you had had your way you would have given me all that money. You--Mr. Levy, you say that it is just a matter of business. What profit did you expect to make?"

"I expected--to make you happy," I said; and she looked up at me suddenly; and I saw what I saw. "Little girl!" I cried. "May I try? In another way."

I held out my arms, and she dropped into them.

"My profits!" I said.

"Oh!" she cried. "I hope so. I will try--try--try!"

Mr. Levy offered me a fresh cigar and took another himself.

"It's a cla.s.s of profit that's difficult to estimate," he remarked. "I had a difficulty with Isaac over the matter. You see he has 5 per cent.

over the business that he introduces, but that was only meant for small transactions, I argued. He argued that there were no profits at all; not meaning any disrespect to her, but holding that there was no money in it; or, if there was, it was a loss because I'd have to keep her, and n.o.body knew how a wife would turn out. She held much the same, except that she was sure she was going to turn out good; but she thought I ought to find some plan of doing something for Isaac. We settled it that way. He wanted to get married, so I gave him a rise and let them have the rooms over the shop to live in; and there they are now."

"And how do you reckon the profits yourself?" I asked.

"Well," he said "in these last eight years I've cleared forty thousand pounds, though you wouldn't think it in this little shop. I reckon that I cleared a good bit more over that ditty-box. Come round to my house one evening, and I'll introduce you to her."

IV

THE YELLOW CAT

An Idyll of the Summer

By ANNIE E.P. SEARING

THE minister of Blue Mountain Church, and the minister's wife, were enjoying their first autumn fire, and the presence of the cat on the hearth between them.

"He came home this afternoon," the minister's wife was saying, "while I was picking those last peppers in the garden, and he jumped on my shoulder and purred against my ear as unconcernedly as if he'd only been for a stroll in the lower pasture, instead of gone for three months--the little wretch!"

"It does seem extraordinary"--the minister unbent his long legs and recrossed them carefully, in order to remove his foot from the way of the tawny back where it stretched out in blissful elongation--"very extraordinary, that an animal could lead that sort of double life, disappearing completely when summer comes and returning promptly with the fall. I daresay it's a reversion to the old hunting instinct. No doubt we could find him if we knew how to trail him on the mountains."

"The strangest thing about it is that this year and last he came back fat and sleek--always before, you know, he has been so gaunt and starved looking in the fall." She leaned over and stroked the cat under his chin; he purred deeply in response, and looked up into her eyes, his own like wells of unfathomed speech. "I have an eerie feeling," she said, "that if he could talk he'd have great things to tell."

The minister laughed, and puffed away at his corncob pipe. "Tales of the chase, my dear, of hecatombs of field-mice and squirrels!"