"Well, now, I want one of them to put into a little niche at the head of my stairway," continued the gentleman. "If you will shoot one for me, and mount it, I'll give you three dollars for it."
"I am afraid I can't do it, Mr. Shaw. They are very scarce; and those I shot last winter I found by accident."
"Then get up a little earlier in the morning and hunt a little later at night, and I'll give you five dollars. If you succeed, bring the bird around, and your money is ready."
"I'll do my best. Now I'll just tell you what's the truth," said Oscar to himself, as he pulled his collar up around his ears, and once more turned his face toward home. "I've got some friends yet. I can make the first payment on that mortgage, interest and all, and have a little money left to keep us in fuel and provisions until I can earn more. Two orders in one day! They came in just at the right time, too. I haven't had a chance to sell a bird before for six months."
Oscar did not know that the orders he had just received had been obtained for him that morning through the influence of Mr. Parker.
If he had known it, he would have lost no time in hunting up his benefactor and thanking him for the interest he took in his welfare.
But attributing his unexpected stroke of fortune to his good luck, which he believed had not yet wholly deserted him, he walked homeward with a light heart; and the smile he carried into his mother's presence was instantly reflected from her own face.
"Yes, I have found work," said he, in reply to her inquiring look. "I've a chance to make as much money in a week as I could have made in the store in two months. Mr. Jackson wants a case of birds something like the one I sold Mr. Parker, and Mr. Shaw wants a horned owl. I am not certain that I shall be able to fill the last order, for an owl is a bird you can't find every day; but I shall do my best, for a five-dollar bill is worth trying for."
Oscar ran upstairs to his room, and when he came down again he was dressed for work.
Taking a bunch of keys from a nail in the kitchen, he hurried through the wood-shed and paused in front of the door leading into his workshop.