oing to remove; and I'm sure
no one could find fault with it."

"Yes: but you surely don't suppose I'm going to turn my back on my old
neighbours altogether?"

"What you say is very kind," replied Tommy; "but, Mr. Horn, we can't
expect to see you very often after this."

"Well, friend, perhaps oftener than you think." Then he told them that he
had bought the house in which he had lived amongst them, and meant to keep
it up, and come there almost every day to mend boots and shoes, without
charge for his poor customers.

"Well, to be sure!" exclaimed Tommy Dudgeon, while John chuckled
exultantly to the twins, and Mrs. John moved her iron more vigorously to
and fro, and hastily raised her hand to brush away a grateful and admiring
tear.

Meanwhile "Cobbler" Horn was considering how he might most delicately
disclose the special purpose of his visit.

"But after all," he said at length, "this is a farewell visit. I'm going
away, and, after to-morrow, I shall not be your neighbour any more."

For some moments his hand had been once more in his pocket, fingering the
bank-notes. He now drew them forth very much in the way in which a man
entrapped into a den of robbers might draw a pocket-pistol, and smoothed
them out upon his knee.

"I thought, old friend," he said, turning to Tommy Dudgeon, "that perhaps
you might be willing to accept a trifling memento of our long
acquaintance. And, indeed, you mustn't say no."

John Dudgeon was too deeply engaged with the twins to note what was said;
Tommy but dimly perceived the drift of his friend; but upon Mrs. John the
full truth flashed with the clearness of noon.

The next moment the notes were being transferred to the hands of the
astonished Tommy. John was still absorbed with his couple of babies. Mrs.
John was ironing more furiously than ever. Tommy felt, with his finger and
thumb, that there were many of the notes; and he perceived that he and his
were being made the recipients of an act of stupendous generosity. Tears
trickled down his cheeks; his throat and tongue were parched. He tried to
thrust the bank-notes back into the hand of his friend.

"Mr. Horn, you must not beggar yourself on our account."

"Cobbler" laughed. In truth, he was much relieved. It seemed that his
humble friend objected to his gift only because he thought it was too
large.

"'Beggar' myself, Tommy?" he cried. "I should have to be a very reckless
spendthrift indeed to do that. You forget how