The poor, toil-worn soul was overwhelmed with surprise and joy.
The sum represented a fortune in her eyes, to which the grateful tears rushed in torrents.
“Oh, I can never thank you enough! This will be like riches to my poor sister and me! She can have the comforts that an incurably sick woman needs now, thanks to your generosity! But I feel I don’t deserve it, when I remember how I had to send sweet Jessie away to earn her own living!”
“Do not worry over that, because it could not be helped. You did more than you were able, taking the little boys on your hands. I shall take care of them now and put them to school.”
“They were welcome to all I could do, poor little ones, and I love them dearly as the children of my dead brother and his sweet wife, but I am glad you can take care of them, and bring them up to be something in the great world,” she replied, with honest pride in her brother’s children.
“I will do my best,” he replied, bowing himself out, after promising to return in a day or two and make arrangements for taking Mark and Willie away.
Then so eager was he for another sight of Verna, that he must needs call again and tell her about his nephews and ask her advice about their future.
“I believe I neglected to tell you that I am fairly rich myself and can afford to do well by the boys without wronging you or Jessie,” he added.
To his surprise and delight she replied:
“I am almost sorry you are rich, Leon, for I would like to show you how generous I could be with these little ones, but they shall be my nephews as well as yours, and I insist on your bringing them here to-morrow to make their home with us.”