"One thousand and sixty dollars!" he gasped. Then, to David: "Boy, in Heaven's name, who are you?"
"I don't know—only David." The boy spoke wearily, with a grieved sob in his voice. He was very tired, a good deal perplexed, and a little angry. He wished, if no one wanted this gold, that he could take it upstairs again to the chimney cupboard; or, if they objected to that, that they would at least give it to him, and let him go away now to that beautiful music he was to hear, and to those kind people who were always to understand what he said when he played.
"Of course," ventured Perry Larson diffidently, "I ain't professin' ter know any great shakes about the hand of the Lord, Mr. Holly, but it do strike me that this 'ere gold comes mighty near bein' proverdential—fur you."
Simeon Holly fell back in his seat. His eyes clung to the gold, but his lips set into rigid lines.
"That money is the boy's, Larson. It isn't mine," he said.
"He's give it to ye."
Simeon Holly shook his head.
"David is nothing but a child, Perry. He doesn't realize at all what he is doing, nor how valuable his gift is."
"I know, sir, but you DID take him in, when there wouldn't nobody else do it," argued Larson. "An', anyhow, couldn't you make a kind of an I O U of it, even if he is a kid? Then, some day you could pay him back. Meanwhile you'd be a-keepin' him, an' a-schoolin' him; an' that's somethin'."
"I know, I know," nodded Simeon Holly thoughtfully, his eyes going from the gold to David's face. Then, aloud, yet as if to himself, he breathed: "Boy, boy, who was your father? How came he by all that gold—and he—a tramp!"