"Yes; I'm going to be an heiress. Wait until I show you the letter," which she did, to the no small astonishment of Bill Watson.
"Well, well," he said over and over again, when Helen and Joe told of the answer they had sent the New York lawyers. "Suppose you do get some money, Helen?"
"It's too good to suppose. I can't imagine any one leaving me money."
"I wish I knew a fairy godmother who would leave me some," murmured Joe. "But that wouldn't happen in a blue moon."
Bill Watson turned, and looked rather curiously at the young circus performer.
"Well, now, do you know, Joe Strong," he said, "I have an idea."
"An idea!" cried Helen gaily. "How nice, Bill. Tell us about it!"
"Now just a moment, young lady. Don't get too excited with an old man just off a sick bed. But Joe's speaking that way—I call you Joe, as I knew your folks so well—Joe's speaking that way gave me an idea. I wouldn't be so terribly surprised, my boy, if you did have money left you some day."
"How?" asked Joe in surprise.
"Why, your mother, whom, as I said, I knew very well, came of a very rich and aristocratic family in England. She was disowned by them when she married your father—as if public performers weren't as good as aristocrats, any day! But never mind about that. Your mother certainly was rich when she was a girl, Joe, and it may be she is entitled to money from the English estates now, or, rather, you would be, since she is dead. That's my idea."