"Any children, sir? Children always like Easter eggs, you know."
"No," said the General; "no one but a son in the Philippines—a son some six feet two in his stockings."
"Any grandchildren, sir?" hopefully.
"Bless my soul," said the General, testily, "what a lot of questions!" And he hurried off to his carriage.
Jimmy felt very forlorn. The General had been his last hope. The eggs were a dead loss.
At last it came time to close up, and he piled all of his wares in a basket. Then he took out a little broom and began to sweep in an orderly way around his little stall. He had a battered old dustpan, and as he carried it out to the street to empty it, he saw a stiff greenish-gray paper sticking out of the dirt. Nothing in the world ever looks exactly like that but an American greenback, and, sure enough, when Jimmy pulled it out it proved to be a ten-dollar bill.
Jimmy sat down on the curb suddenly. His money always came in pennies and nickels and dimes and quarters. The Little Mother sometimes earned a dollar at a time, but never in his whole life had Jimmy possessed a ten-dollar bill.
Think of the possibilities to a little, poor, cold, worried boy. There was two months' rent in that ten-dollar bill—two months in which he would not have to worry over whether there would be a roof over their heads.
Then there was a basket stall in that ten-dollar bill. That had always been his ambition. Some one had told him that baskets sold well in other cities, and not a single person had opened a basket stall in Old Market, and that was Jimmy's chance. Once established, he knew he could earn a good living.
As for ten dollars' worth of groceries and provisions, Jimmy's mind could not grasp such a thing; fifty cents had always been the top limit for a grocery bill.