II
Finally, they reached Bernardsville, and Uncle Dick drew up before a large stone building. “This is a bank, a place where dollars grow,” he explained. “Come inside with me and, if you wish, we will plant your dollar.”
He led the way to a window over a high counter.
“How do you do, Mr. Cashier?” he said. “This young man is my nephew, and he wishes to plant a dollar so that it may start to grow. Will you please show him the right place to plant it?”
“Indeed I shall be glad to,” said the man behind the window. “If your nephew will hand me his dollar, I will plant it for him.”
Richard gravely pulled the money from his pocket and handed it through the window. The man gave him a card and asked him to write his name.
When Richard returned the card, Mr. Cashier took up a neat little book, wrote Richard’s name on the cover and made a note inside the book, which said that Richard had one dollar in the bank. Then he gave him the book, together with a pretty nickel home-safe, such as savings banks keep for children who save pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, and, sometimes, even dollars.
“This is a home-savings bank,” explained Mr. Cashier. “Your dollar which you handed through the window will grow in two ways. We will make it grow by paying you interest. You may make it grow by adding more money to it. You take this little nickel safe, and put your pennies and other money into it; when you come again to our bank, bring it with you. See, here is the key I shall use for unlocking it. I will add what is in it to the dollar you already have.”
“Don’t we get the key?” asked Richard in a whisper, as other people came up to the window, and he and his uncle passed on.