“I’d have to hide the bank book then;” and Tim chuckled. “Think of havin’ a bank account! Why, we’d feel a’most like Astor, or the old Commodore.”
“But I wish you would, Tim. I’m afraid to have so much in the house. It will be something against winter when business is dull. Now we’re making plenty to live on. Won’t you, Tim?”
“To be sure I will—to-morrow. And we’ll hide the book in that same chink in the floor. No one would think of looking there. And we’ll have a rousin’ time on some ’xcursion. We’ll choose one with a brass band, and have a little dance in one corner by ourselves. There isn’t the beat of Miss May in this whole world.”
“She’s good, but then she’s rich, you know. Five dollars doesn’t look so large to her as it does to you and me. But, Tim, I love you better than a hundred Miss Mays.”
Tim chuckled and winked hard, but said never a word.
He was off early in the morning, as he had an important job on hand. Jerry would have dinner all ready at noon, and he would put on his “store clothes” and go down to the bank like any other swell. My eyes! Weren’t they in clover?
Tim could not get home until three; but he had earned two dollars since morning. They each had a key to the door, and finding it locked, Tim drew out his. Jerry had gone to business; afternoons were his time. There was no dinner set out on the table and covered with a napkin. A curious chill of something like neglect went to Tim’s warm heart; but he whistled it away, found a bite of cold meat and some oatmeal. Then he decided he would run over on Broadway and tell Jerry of his good luck. It was too late to think of going to the bank.
No little chap sat on the well-known corner. Tim walked up a block, down again, and studied the cross street sharply. Had he sold out and gone home? Or may be he had taken the money to the bank! Tim ran home again. Yes, that was it. The money was gone.
He waited and waited. Somehow he did not feel a bit jolly; but he boiled the kettle and laid the supper. No Jerry yet. What had become of him? Had he put on his best suit?
They had made a clothes-press out of a dry goods box, and Tim went to inspect it. Why—Jerry’s shelf was entirely empty. Shirts, stockings, yes, everything, even to his old every-day suit, gone. Tim dropped on the floor, and hid his face in his hands. Had Jerry—