"Ah," she exclaimed, "you are the miser's boy."
Gabriel could not knock Mother Lemon down, so he only hung his head while his cheeks grew redder.
"It isn't your fault, child, and by the time you are grown you will be rich. When that time comes, I pray you be kinder to me than your father is, for he oppresses the poor and makes me pay my last shilling for the rent of this hovel."
"I would give the cottage to you if it were mine," returned Gabriel, looking straight into her eyes with his honest gray ones; "but at present I am poorer than you."
"In that case," said Mother Lemon, "I wish I had something worthy to reward you for your kindness to me. As I have not, here is a penny that you must keep to remember me by." And in spite of Gabriel's protestations she took from her side-pocket a coin.
"I cannot take it from you," protested the boy.
"No one ever grew richer by refusing to give," returned Mother Lemon, and she tucked the penny inside Gabriel's blouse and turned him out the door with her blessing; so that, being a peaceable boy of few words, he objected no longer, but moved along the road toward home, for it was nearly dinner time.
He found his stepmother setting the table, and his father busily calculating with figures on a bit of paper.
"Get the water, Gabriel, and be quick now," was his welcome from the sorry-faced woman.
When he had done all she directed him, there was still a little time, for William and Henry had not come in from the field. Gabriel sat down near his father and, noting a rusty, dusty little book lying on the table, he picked it up.