Auntie stopped. I think there were tears in her eyes.
"And what did you do, Auntie?" we all cried.
"What could I have done but what I did?" she said. "I don't know if it would have been better not—better to let his simple honesty be its own reward. I could not resist it; of course I gave him another penny! He thanked me again quite simply; I am sure it never struck him that he had done anything to be praised for, and I didn't praise him, I just gave him the penny. And oh, how his bright eyes gleamed! He looked now as if he thought he had wealth enough at his command to buy all the cookies in the shop."
"So he hadn't only been pertending to buy," said "Budder." "Poor little boy, he had been toosing—toosing what he would buy. I'm so glad you gave him anoder penny, Auntie."
"He's so gad him got anoder penny," echoed Baby; though, to tell the truth, I am not sure that he had been listening to the story. He had been making up for lost time by crunching away at his biscuit. And when the boys said "Good night," Auntie gave them each another biscuit, and mother smiled and said it was because it was Auntie's first night. But "Budder" told Baby afterwards, by some funny reasoning of his own, that they had got another biscuit each, "'cos of that poor little boy who wasn't greedy."
And Baby, of course, was quite satisfied, as "Budder" said so.
I think I shall always remember that little cripple boy when I see cocoa-nut cakes, and it will make me like them, if possible, better than ever.