e than one
pair of eyes sparkle and stare. None could remember ever to have seen
so large an amount displayed outside a bank window.

Even John's hands trembled slightly as he began to count the double
eagles first, pushing each five of these toward his small co-laborer
and reckoning:

"One hundred. Two hundred. Three hundred--one thousand!"

"One thousand!" echoed Jessica, in turn handing the pile to her
mother, while the others watched, counting each for himself in
silence, ready to check any blunder that might be made.

That is, the men were silent, but Elsa and Aunt Sally rather disturbed
the proceedings; the former, by eagerly reaching out for the piles as
each was arranged before the mistress, and being as regularly rebuked
by the latter.

"There you go again, woman! How can they count right if you don't have
patience? Keep your hands still, do," said Mrs. Benton.

"Keep your tongue, mother, too. Two thousand!" rejoined John.

"Two--thousand!" cried Jessica, tallying. But her voice had now lost
its impatience, and she began to have a very different feeling in
regard to this "money," which looked so real, and was so much needed
at Sobrante. If Pedro's "copper" could be transmuted into shining
golden eagles, why, after all, she guessed she didn't hate it quite so
much.

"Three--thousand--and--ain't half--touched yet!" gasped Samson,
throwing up his great hands in a gesture of astonishment.

Elsa was also gasping then, and the expression of her face was
changing into one from which Mrs. Trent involuntarily turned her eyes.
Cunning and avarice predominated, and in the woman's throat was a
curious clicking sound, as if she had lost and were trying to find her
voice. Which, when found, seemed not to belong to the good-natured
Elsa, so changed it was:

"Ach, me! But I forgot already. I guess--it was not three t'ousand; it
was two times so much. That was seven t'ousand, is it not? The money
of this America--it so confuse, yes," and she tapped her forehead with
one fat finger, while her eyes grew beady, and seemed to shrink in
size as they gazed upon the wealth she coveted.

But Wolfgang would have none of this. He was as honest as the sun,
and, till that moment, had supposed his wife to be of one mind with
him. Indeed, honest she had been, in thought and deed, until that
terrible temptation was spread before her.

"Elsa! Elsa Winkler! Is it my wife you was and would lie--lie--for a
bit of that rubbish!"