"Are you sure you have got it all, John?" she said. "Hadn't you better count it?"
"I don't know how much there was," father said. "I never count it till I go upstairs; it's just what I've taken to-day; but if we've left any on the floor, it will turn up to-morrow when you are sweeping."
Mother said no more, but took Salome upstairs, and put her to bed. She was asleep when I went to bed, and so was Simon. I had time now to think of my trouble, and of what I should do. I could not now forget it. I must settle what was to be done, for the bill must be paid before school-time the next morning. I was very unhappy; I could not bear to think that the master would call me untrustworthy and careless, and I made up my mind at last to tell my father in the morning, and to beg him to give me a shilling to make up the amount.
It was a very hot night; there did not seem to be a breath of air. I tossed restlessly on my bed; but I could not sleep. Salome tossed about also, and, after a time, she woke, sat up in bed, and asked me for a drink of water. There was no water in the bedroom, so I lighted a candle, and went downstairs to get some for her.
I had to pass through the kitchen to get to the pump in the little scullery beyond. As I opened the scullery door, the light of my candle fell on something shining on the floor, and I stooped down to see what it was.
It was a shilling! It must have rolled there when Salome was spinning the money, and, having just gone under the door, we had not seen it. I picked it up, and at that moment the Tempter put a wicked thought in my mind. I know now that it came from him, though I did not know it then.
Why should I not take this shilling to make up for the one I had lost? Father would never know; he had no idea how much money he had taken that day; he kept no account of ready money taken over the counter. He would never find out that he was a shilling short. And after all, I thought he would not lose by it. If I told him in the morning of my loss, he would be obliged to give me a shilling, and if I took this one, it would come to just the same thing.
So I carried the shilling upstairs, and wrapped it up in the bill with the four shillings the master had given me. And the next morning I paid Betson, and handed the receipt to my master.
"Thank you, Peter," he said; "I knew you were a lad to be trusted!"
Oh, how those words hurt me! A lad to be trusted; so he thought; but I knew that I was a thief. Yes, a thief!