Gull's pale cheeks flushed.
He stammered out, "You'd—you'd best take it back, sir." It seemed to him as if this was some new form of that terrible temptation which had been assailing him all that long day; and he thrust the half-sovereign forward again.
"No, no! Keep it, man!" repeated Mr. Kingsley. "I'm not going to say a word about your honesty. You are just as much a man as I am; and a true man is always honest. But keep it, because the Christmas bells will ring to-night."
"Thank you, sir."
Written, the words appear cold; but said, as Gull said them, they carried an amount of warmth and gratitude which quite satisfied Mr. Kingsley without the half-involuntary speech that followed, "So there will be boots for the little lads, after all!"
"Bless the man! How jolly you look! Did you get your tanner, then?"
This was the ticket collector's greeting as Gull passed.
"Yon gent's a trump, and no mistake!" answered the other as he hurried along, eager for the delight which such a story would bring to the little ears now listening for his coming in that third floor front in Pleasant Court.
I wonder what it was that moved Mr. Kingsley to a wider generosity that evening than was at all usual in the money-wise, business man? Could it have been that he was led to it partly by the fact—though he was quite unconscious of it—that there was something similar in the home relations of these two men?
For Mr. Kingsley was also a widower; and it was his little only daughter who was pressing her tiny nose against the window-pane, and trying to guess how many people would go by the gate before daddy set it swinging and came up the drive.