“No, only that I should question my convenience more closely.”
“Ah, never mind. I take all the responsibility. I shall cheerfully consent to being imposed upon by you.”
Mrs. Van Kirk in the mean while had been examining the contents of a fragrant Russia-leather pocket-book, and she now drew out two crisp ten-dollar notes, and held them out toward him.
“I prefer to make sure of you by paying you in advance,” said she, with a cheerfully familiar nod, and a critical glance at his attire, the meaning of which he did not fail to detect. “Somebody else might make the same discovery that we have made to-day, and outbid us. And we do not want to be cheated out of our good fortune in having been the first to secure so valuable a prize.”
“You need have no fear on that score, madam,” retorted Halfdan, with a vivid blush, and purposely misinterpreting the polite subterfuge. “You may rely upon my promise. I shall be here again, as soon as you wish me to return.”
“Then, if you please, we shall look for you to-morrow morning at ten o’clock.”
And Mrs. Van Kirk hesitatingly folded up her notes and replaced them in her pocket-book.
To our idealist there was something extremely odious in this sudden offer of money. It was the first time any one had offered to pay him, and it seemed to put him on a level with a common day-laborer. His first impulse was to resent it as a gratuitous humiliation, but a glance at Mrs. Van Kirk’s countenance, which was all aglow with officious benevolence, re-assured him, and his indignation died away.
That same afternoon Olson, having been informed of his friend’s good fortune, volunteered a loan of a hundred dollars, and accompanied him to a fashionable tailor, where he underwent a pleasing metamorphosis.