“Certainly, dear, you are welcome to hide anything in it you like. Mary knows the combination better than I do. I always have to look it up in one of Captain Price’s old note books. I am sorry you won’t have some tea and cake, but I suppose you are all off for a spin this afternoon. It has done Mary more good than I can tell you, your motor car. The child is always studying so hard to hurry up and be a teacher and take care of her old mother, so she says.”
“Only a few years more, Mother, and you shall never have to work again,” said Mary. “Some day I shall be the Principal of West Haven High School, when Miss Gray gets too old to work——”
“What’s this?” exclaimed Miss Gray herself, at the door. She had been drinking tea inside with some friends. “Who’s going to lay me on the shelf before my time?”
“Mary intends to step into your shoes, Miss Gray,” laughed Mrs. Price. “Look out for her. She is a dangerous rival. She means to pay off all our mortgages and things, and provide for her mother’s old age.”
Miss Gray pinched Mary’s cheek.
“Yes,” insisted Mary stoutly, “all I want is money, money, money.”
The Principal patted the young girl’s cheek kindly.
“Don’t be too mad about it, child. It won’t buy everything, you know.”
It was only an idle speech of Mary’s but you all know how much meaning can sometimes be given to words spoken thoughtlessly and the day was to come when Mary was to regret very deeply having used those words.
All this time Billie had been standing quietly waiting for the moment when they could leave the older people and consign the box to the iron safe upstairs.