"Don't, mother!" they cried in chorus, so passionately that Mrs. Carey changed the subject quickly. "How much a year does it make, Nancy?"
"Three hundred and sixty plus one hundred plus two hundred equals six hundred and sixty," read Nancy. "And I call it a splendid big lump of money!"
"Oh, my dear," sighed her mother with a shake of the head, "if you knew the difficulty your father and I have had to take care of ourselves and of you on five and six times that sum! We may have been a little extravagant sometimes following him about,—he was always so anxious to have us with him,—but that has been our only luxury."
"We saved enough out of exchanging the grand piano to pay all the expenses down here, and all our railway fares, and everything so far, in the way of boards and nails and Osh Popham's labor," recalled Gilbert.
"Yes, and we are still eating the grand piano at the end of two months, but it's about gone, isn't it, Muddy?" Nancy asked.
"About gone, but it has been a great help, and our dear little old-fashioned square is just as much of a comfort.—Of course there's the tapestry and the Van Twiller landscape Uncle gave me; they may yet be sold."
"Somebody'll buy the tapestry, but the Van Twiller'll go hard," and
Gilbert winked at Nancy.
"A picture that looks just the same upside down as the right way about won't find many buyers," was Nancy's idea.
"Still it is a Van Twiller, and has a certain authentic value for all time!"
"The landscapes Van Twiller painted in the dark, or when he had his blinders on, can't be worth very much," insisted Gilbert. "You remember the Admiral thought it was partridges nesting in the underbrush at twilight, and then we found Joanna had cleaned the dining room and hung the thing upside down. When it was hung the other end up neither father nor the Admiral could tell what it was; they'd lost the partridges and couldn't find anything else!"