After John had left him, as he was walking towards the wagon, with the intention of retiring for the night, his foot struck against something which attracted his attention. He kicked it once or twice, to determine what it was, and then picked it up.
"By gracious!" he exclaimed; "it is a pocketbook. My fortune is made;" and without stopping to consider the matter any further, he scrambled into the wagon.
His heart jumped with excitement, for his vivid imagination had already led him to the conclusion that it was stuffed full of money. It might contain a hundred dollars, perhaps five hundred; and these sums were about as far as his ideas could reach.
He could buy a suit of new clothes, a new cap, new shoes, and be as spruce as any of the boys he had seen about the city. Then he could go to a boarding house, and live like a prince, till he could get a place that suited him; for Harry, however rich he might be, did not think of living without labor of some kind. He could dress himself up in fine broadcloth, present himself at the jeweler's shop where they wanted a boy, and then see whether he would make a good scarecrow.
Then his thoughts reverted to the cabin, where he had slept two nights, and, of course, to the little angel, who had supplied the commissary department during his sojourn in the woods. He could dress himself up with the money in the pocketbook, and, after a while, when he got a place, take the stage for Rockville. Wouldn't she be astonished to see him then, in fine broadcloth! Wouldn't she walk with him over to the spot where he had killed the black snake! Wouldn't she be proud to tell her father that this was the boy she had fed in the woods!
What would she say to him? He had promised to write to her when he got settled, and tell her how he got along, and whether he was good or not. What should he say? How glad she would be to hear that he was getting along so finely!
"Stop!" said he to himself. "What have I been thinking about? This pocketbook isn't mine."
I am sorry to say it, but Harry really felt sad when the thought occurred to him. He had been building very pretty air castles on this money, and this reflection suddenly tumbled them all down—new clothes, new cap, boarding house, visit to Rockville—all in a heap.
"But I found it," Harry reasoned with himself.
Something within him spoke out, saying: