"I'm willing to go to bed," said Tony. "I've walked a good deal to-day, and I'm tired."
They went into the house. There was a heap of rags in the corner of the room when they entered.
"That's my bed," said old Ben; "it's all I have."
"I can sleep on the floor," said Tony.
He took off his jacket, and rolled it up for a pillow, and stretched himself out on the bare floor. He had often slept so before.
CHAPTER VIII. TONY HIRES OUT AS A COOK AND HOUSEKEEPER.
Tony was not slow in going to sleep. Neither his hard bed nor his strange bed-chamber troubled him. He could sleep anywhere. That was one of the advantages of his checkered life.
Generally he slept all night without awaking, but to-night, for some unknown reason, he awoke about two o'clock. It was unusually light for that hour, and so he was enabled to see what at first startled him. The old man was out of bed, and on his knees in the center of the room. He had raised a plank, forming a part of the flooring, and had raised from beneath it a canvass bag full of gold pieces. He was taking them out and counting them, apparently quite unconscious of Tony's presence.