"Of course you didn't steal it!" cried John Henry. "But where did you get it? You haven't had more than a few cents at a time for weeks and weeks, so you can't have saved it!"
"I didn't beg it either," Newton answered.
"Or borrow it, my boy?"
"No! I wasn't going to borrow money I couldn't pay! I'd rather not tell you, all the same, father! At least, I earned twenty cents of it. That's the odd twenty, that makes the three seventy. I don't mind telling you that."
"Oh, you earned twenty cents of it? Well, I'm glad of that, anyhow. What did you do?"
"I sort of hung round the depôt till the train came in, and I carried a man's valise across to the hotel for him. He gave me ten cents. Some of the boys do that, you know, but I thought you wouldn't care to have me do it till I had to!"
"That's all right. It does you credit. How about the other ten cents?"
"Old Bangs saw me pass his shop, and he asked me to come in and said he'd give me ten cents if I'd do some sums for him. I guess he's pretty busy just now. He said he'd give me ten cents every day till Christmas if I'd come in after school and do the sums. His boy's got mumps or something, and can't. There's no harm in that, is there, father?"
"Harm! I'm proud of you, my boy. You'll win through—some day!"
It was the first relief from his misery the poor man had felt since he had read the letter about the overdraft in the morning.