Asher opened his fine new pocket-book, and seeing a piece of paper in it, took it out, stared, put it back, looked at it again with a dazed expression, and got up, overturning his chair. His old father looked up from the warm dressing-gown they had put on him, and which he was smoothing like a pleased child.
“What ails ye, Asher?” asked the old man.
“Sit down, man, sit down!” said John James in an undertone, picking up the chair.
“Lawsee, but I can’t! John, this is too much! Why, John, I never heard—”
“Oh, keep quiet, Asher! Sit down, I tell you!”
“Father, this is a cashier’s draft on a Boston bank for five hundred an’ fifty dollars. It pays the last o’ the mor’gidge an’ interest, father! John, I can’t take it—after all this!” said Asher, waving his hands widely abroad at the gifts around him.
“Nonsense, Asher!—yes, you will, too. Man, I never had such fun in my life before! Pour him some coffee, somebody, please.”
“John!” said Asher, gripping his hand hard and choking.
“You see, Asher, I thought ’twas high time you got paid off for that whipping you took for me long ago, when I deserved it.”
“Oh, thunder!” said Asher, unable to speak another word.