you asked for it. One day he thought he had a bad mark and he couldn't
eat any dinner--you thought he was ill; but he went to Miss Skinner the
next day and she took it off because he had been trying so hard to be
good. Joe, why don't you speak?"

"George, I'm proud of you!" said Langshaw simply. There was a slight
huskiness in his voice; the round face and guileless blue eyes of his
little boy, who had tried "awful hard to be good," seemed to have
acquired a new dignity. The father saw in him the grown-up son who could
be depended upon to look after his mother if need were. Langshaw held
out his hand as man to man; the two pairs of eyes met squarely. "Nothing
you could have done would have pleased me more than this, George. I
value it more than any Christmas present I could have."

"Mother said you'd like it," said the beaming George, ducking his head
suddenly and kicking out his legs from behind.

"And you'll pay the five dollars?" supplemented Clytie anxiously.

"Surely!" said Langshaw. The glances of the parents met in one of the
highest pleasures that life affords: the approval together of the good
action of their dear child. "George can go out and get this ten-dollar
bill changed."

"If you can't spare it, father--" suggested the boy with some new sense
of manliness, hanging back.

"I'm glad to be able to spare it," said the father soberly. "It's a good
deal of money," he added. "I suppose, of course, you'll put it in the
bank, George?"

"Now you mustn't ask what he's going to do with it," said Clytie.

"Oh, isn't it much!" cried little Mary.

"Dear me, there's the doorbell," said Clytie. "Who can it be at this
hour? Run, George, and see!"

"It's a letter for you, mother," announced George, reappearing. "There's
a man in the hall, waiting for an answer."

"It looks like a bill," said Clytie nervously, tearing open the
envelope; "but I don't owe any bill. Why, it's two and a quarter, from
the tailor, for fixing over my old suit last fall! I'm positive I paid
it weeks ago. There's some mistake."

"He says he's been here three times, but you were out."

"Have you any money for it, Clytie?" asked her husband.

Clytie looked as if a thunderbolt had struck her.

"Yes, I have; but--oh, I don't want to take it for that! I need every
penny I've got."

"Well, there's no need of feeling so badly about it," said Langshaw
resignedly.

"Give the ten-dollar bill to the man, George, and see if he can change
i