“Only that you fired a shot at random and made a bull’s-eye,” laughed Jack.
Paddy looked more puzzled than ever, but suddenly she leaned forward and exclaimed:
“You don’t mean that you have come in for a fortune, Jack?”
“Not exactly,” he answered, “only a trifle of 20,000 pounds.”
“You’ve got 20,000 pounds?” incredulously.
“Yes. An obliging relative of my mother’s, I had scarcely heard of, died a little while ago and left no other heirs but me.”
For a moment Paddy was too astonished to speak, and they all watched her with eager happiness in their eyes. Undoubtedly there was more to come. At last she looked up with a twinkle.
“My! if you’d only had it a bit sooner, Jack,” she said, “we might have bought up all the chocolate in Mrs White’s shop, and all the bull’s-eyes, and all the licorice. Goodness! what a feast we would have had.”
“We’ll do lots better than that,” he cried. “We’ll have new boats, and new rifles, and new fishing-rods.”
“I’m thinking that isn’t quite what brought Jack home after all,” remarked Miss Jane.