“Honestly! to be sure I did; I earned it all.”
“Lord bless me, earned it! well, I’ve a great mind to work; but then it’s such hot weather, besides, grandmother says I’m not strong enough yet for hard work; and besides, I know how to coax daddy out of money when I want it, so I need not work. But four and sevenpence; let’s see, what will you do with it all?”
“That’s a secret,” said Jem, looking great.
“I can guess; I know what I’d do with it if it was mine. First, I’d buy pocketfuls of gingerbread; then I’d buy ever so many apples and nuts. Don’t you love nuts? I’d buy nuts enough to last me from this time to Christmas, and I’d make little Newton crack ’em for me, for that’s the worst of nuts; there’s the trouble of cracking ’em.”
“Well, you never deserve to have a nut.”
“But you’ll give me some of yours,” said Lawrence, in a fawning tone; for he thought it easier to coax than to work—“you’ll give me some of your good things, won’t you?”
“I shall not have any of those good things,” said Jem.
“Then, what will you do with all your money?”
“Oh, I know very well what to do with it; but, as I told you, that’s a secret, and I sha’n’t tell it anybody. Come now, let’s go back and play—their game’s up, I daresay.”
Lawrence went back with him, full of curiosity, and out of humour with himself and his eightpence. “If I had four and sevenpence,” said he to himself, “I certainly should be happy!”