or old Nutty be doing with a
twenty-five dollar medal?"

The dull eyes of the old junk dealer kindled with quick interest.

"Hev you got a medal?" he asked. "Where did you get it?"

"From a batty old sailor man who thought I had done him some good turns,"
answered Dan. "Where he got it he didn't say. I don't think he could
remember."

And Dan, whose only safe deposit for boyish treasures was his jacket
pocket, pulled out the gift that Freddy had refused, and showed it to this
new acquaintance, who, holding it off in his horny hand, blinked at it
with practised eye.

"Portugee or Spanish, I don't know which it says on that thar rim. Thar
ain't much of it silver. I'd have to rub it up to be sure of the rest.
Date, well as I can make out, it's 1850."

"It is," said Dan. "I made that much out myself."

Old Jonah shook his head.

"Ain't far enough back. Takes a good hundred years to make an antique.
Still, you can't tell. The ways of these great folks are queer. Last week
I sold for five dollars a bureau that I was thinking of splitting up into
firewood; and the woman was as tickled as if she had found a purse of
money. Said it was Louey Kans. Who or what she was I don't know; mebbe
some kin of hers. I showed her the break plain, for I ain't no robber; but
she said that didn't count a mite,--that she could have a new glass put in
for ten dollars. Ten dollars! Wal, thar ain't no telling about rich folks'
freaks and foolishness; so I can't say nothing about that thar medal. It
ain't the kind of thing I'd want to gamble on. But if you'd like to leave
it here on show. I'll take care of it, I promise you; and mebbe some one
may come along and take a notion to it."

"Oh, what's the good?" said Dan, hesitating.

"Dan, do--do!" pleaded Freddy, who saw a chance for the vacation pocket
money his chum so sorely lacked. "You might get twenty-five dollars for
it, Dan."

"He might," said old Jonah; "and then again he mightn't, sonny. I ain't
promising any more big deals like them I told you about. But you can't
ever tell in this here junk business whar or when luck will strike you. It
goes hard agin my old woman to hev all this here dust and cobwebs. She has
got as tidy a house as you'd ask to see just around the corner,--flower
garden in front, and everything shiny. But if I'd let her in here with a
bucket and broom she'd ruin my business forever. It's the dust and the
rust and the cobwebs that runs Jonah's junk-shop. But it