“Yes, dear.”
“Well, now, what do you say to buying bits of gold with it?”
“Bits of gold with our hundred pounds?” said Mrs. Holman, staring at Sibyl.
“Yes, that is exactly what I mean; bits of gold. You will be able to if you keep it long enough. If you promise to keep that money safe you may be able to buy great lumps of gold out of my father’s gold mine. My father has gone to Australia to——Oh, I must not tell you, for it really is an awful, awful secret; but, anyhow, when he comes back you’ll be able to make a lot of money out of your money, to buy heaps of bits of gold. Will you promise to keep that hundred pounds till father comes home? That’s what I came about, to ask you to promise, and Watson came with me because Miss Winstead wouldn’t. Will you promise, dear Mrs. Holman?”
“Bless you, darling,” said Mrs. Holman, “so that is why your father has gone away. It do sound exciting.”
“It’s awfully exciting, isn’t it? We shall all be so rich. Mother said so, and mother ought to know. You’ll be rich, and I’ll be rich, and dear, dear nursie will be rich, and even Watson. Watson has got such good impulses. He’ll be rich, too, and he shall marry the girl he is fond of; and there is a friend of mine, he wants to marry another girl, and they shall be rich and they shall marry. Oh, nobody need be sorrowful any more. Everybody will be quite happy when father comes back. You’ll be able to have your shop in Palace Road, and oh, be sure you keep that hundred pounds till then.”
Sibyl did not wait for Mrs. Holman to make any further remark. Mrs. Holman’s eyes looked bright and excited; the child dashed out of the shop.
“Come, Watson,” she said, “you’ll have a splendid appetite for your dinner, and you have done a very good deed. You have denied yourself, Watson, and made a sorrowful woman happy. What do you think of that?”