“Hit’s the way us mounting folks be,” said old Uncle Billie, rubbing his hands together. “If’n we all likes you we likes you a right smart, an’ if’n we all don’t take to you, we can be meaner’n pisen.”
The school was a success in every way. Long before the term came to an end Laurel Branch was looking forward to better things.
One day two months after the school began, Florence received a letter from Mr. Dobson, the coal man. With trembling fingers she tore it open. A small bit of paper fell out. Snatching it up, she read:
“Pay to the order.... Nineteen hundred and sixty dollars!”
“Oh Marion! Marion!” she fairly screamed. “Here’s our commission!”
“That money,” said Mrs. McAlpin, as they sat in fireside council that night, “is your own. You earned it fairly. It is no longer needed for the school. If you feel you must give some, give a tenth of it to the school. It is your duty to use the remainder in completing your own education.”
It was some time before the two girls could be brought to see the matter in this light. Perhaps they feared life would lose its thrill if they were no longer dependent upon their muscles and their wits for their living. In the end they yielded. When, after finishing the winter school, they left the mountains for the University, it was with a full purse.
Florence found that the possession of money did not necessarily rob one of the thrills that life should have. Had she not been free to wander about the city she would not have wandered into a curious place back of the Ghetto at 777 Monroe Street. Had she not been possessed of an unusual amount of cash, she would not have made an extraordinary purchase there, and having missed the purchase, would have lost an unusually romantic and mysterious adventure as well. But she did make the purchase and the adventure came—but the story is a long one and will be found in our next book entitled “The Thirteenth Ring.”
THE END