She sang, in the very abandonment of gayety.
"Are you gone crazy?" he demanded, clutching the floating bills, and then catching her about the waist. "You act like a witch! Where did all this money come from? The savings-bank?"
"No," she returned, becoming quiet, and nestling close to him. "The
Lord sent it by the hand of your brother Orin."
It was some time before John could be made to understand the whole story; and when it had been told, he instantly leaped to the conclusion that the whole credit of Orin's getting the commission belonged of right to Milly, a conviction in which he remained steadfast despite all her disclaimers.
At last she gave up protesting, and shut his mouth with a kiss. Since John, as well as Orin, thought so, she felt that her part must have been more important than she had realized; but she was too modest to bear so much praise.
"John," she said at length, "I have something awful to confess. I've been keeping a secret from you."
"I'm afraid I've been too much of a bear for it to have been safe to tell me," returned her lover, smiling.
His own heart was filled with the double joy of reconciliation, and of having brought it about himself by a manly confession of his fault.
"It wasn't that at all," she protested. "It was because I wasn't sure about it; and then I wanted to surprise you if I got it."
"Got what? You speak as if it was the smallpox. Is it anything catching?"