While the neighbors were crowding around, emitting “ohs” and “ahs” over his find in the broken old desk, the proprietor of “the breakfast for the million” began to look pretty sick.
“Five thousand dollars! My mercy!” gasped the Widow Harrison. “Then Bob didn’t lie about bringing home that fortune when he came from the army.”
“It’s a shame, Widder!” cried one man. “That five thousand ought to belong to you.”
“Dad got it right; didn’t he?” said Lucas, shaking his head sadly. “He allus said Harrison was trying to tell him where it was hid when he had his last stroke.”
Harris Colesworth spoke for the first time since the packages of notes were discovered:
“Mr. Harrison told Cyrus Pritchett that he had hid away ‘that that would be wuth five thousand.’ It’s plain what he had in his mind–and a whole lot of other foolish people had it in their minds just after the Civil War.”
“What do you mean, Mr. Colesworth?” cried Lyddy, who was clinging to the widow’s hand and patting it soothingly.
“Why,” chuckled Harris, “there were folks who believed–and they believed it for years after the Civil War–that some day the Federal Government was going to redeem all the paper money printed by the Confederate States—”
“What?” bawled Lucas, fairly springing off the ground.
“Confederate money?” repeated the crowd in chorus.