"Here it is! here's the umbrella!" squeaked the officious Mr. Chumley,
coming out from behind the entry door, where he had been listening.
All three of them--Jess, Griff, and the excited loser of the
purse--reached for the umbrella; but Griff was the first.
"Hold on!" said he to the landlord. "Let me have that, sir. The purse
was lost in our store. We're just as much interested in the matter as
anybody."
"I fail to see that, young man," said Mrs. Prentice, tartly.
She was not naturally of a mean disposition; but she was excited, and
the explanation Griff had given her of the loss of the purse had seemed
to her unimaginative mind "far-fetched," to say the least.
The boy half opened the umbrella and turned it over. Crash to the floor
fell the purse, and it snapped open as it landed. Out upon the linoleum
rolled the glistening coins--several of them gold pieces--that Jess had
noted so greedily in the egg store.
"What did I tell you?" cried Griff, looking at Mrs. Prentice.
That lady only exclaimed "Oh!" very loudly and looked aghast at the
rolling coins. Jess half stooped to gather up the scattered money. Then
she thought better of it and straightened up, looking straight into the
face of the owner of the purse.
But old Mr. Chumley could not stand the lack of interest the others
seemed to show in what--to him--was the phase of particular importance
in the whole affair. There was real money rolling all over the Widow
Morse's kitchen. He went down on his rheumatic old knees and scrambled
for it. Mr. Chumley worshipped money, anyway, and this was a
worshipper's rightful attitude.
"My, my, my!" he kept repeating. "How careless!"
But Mrs. Prentice's expression of countenance was swiftly changing. She
flushed deeply--much more deeply than had Jess; then she paled. She
picked up Mr. Chumley's phrase, although she allowed the old man to pick
up the money.
"I certainly _have_ been careless," she said. "I--I must have nudged
that purse off the counter with my elbow. I--I----My dear girl! will you
forgive me?"
She stepped forward and opened her arms to Jess. She was not only a well
dressed lady, but she was a handsome one, and her smile, when she chose
to allow it to appear, was winning. The anger and indignation Jess had
felt began to melt before this apology and the lady's frank manner.
"I--I suppose it was a natural mistake," stammered Jess.
"Not if she'd known you, Miss Jess," Griff said, quite sharply for him.
"Nobody who knew you or your mother would have accused you of taking a
penny's worth that didn't rightfully belong to you."
Jess, whose heart was still sore from the blow she had received at Mr.
Closewick's grocery, thought this was very kind of Griff. And they owed
his father, too! If there were tears standing in her eyes they were
tears of gratitude.
"You see, my dear," said the lady, her voice very pleasant indeed now,
"I did not know you as well as young Mr. Vandergriff seems to."
"We--we go to school together," explained Jess, weakly, and found
herself drawn into the arms of the lady.
Mr. Chumley rose up with a grunt and a groan; he had the purse and all
the coins.
"Very careless! very careless!" he repeated. "And here is nearly a
hundred dollars, madam. Think of carelessly carrying a hundred dollars
in a silly purse like that! It is astonishing----"
Mrs. Prentice had implanted a soft little kiss on Jess's forehead and
shaken her a little playfully by both shoulders.
"Don't you bear malice, my dear," she whispered. Then she turned briefly
to the old man.
"You're very kind, I'm sure," she said, taking the purse into which Mr.
Chumley had crammed the money. "Thank you."
"Money comes too hard for folks to scatter it around," complained the
landlord.
Mrs. Prentice seemed to be much amused. "I should be more careful, I
suppose. I presume, now, I ought to count it to see if--if you gathered
it all up, sir?" she added, her eyes dancing.
A little breath of red crept into the withered cheeks of the miserly old
man. "Well, well!" he ejaculated. "One can't be too careful."
"I presume not," said the lady.
"And if the gal had known the money was there she might have been
tempted, ye see."
Jess flushed again and Griff looked angry; but Mrs. Prentice said,
coolly:
"Were _you_ tempted, sir? Perhaps I had better count my money, after
all?"
"Ahem! ahem!" coughed the old gentleman. "Perhaps you don't know who I
am? There is a vast difference between me--my condition, I mean--and the
gal and her mother."
"Ah! Do you think so?" asked Mrs. Prentice, and then turned her back
upon him. "I should like to know you better, my dear--and your mother. I
hope you will show me that I am really forgiven by allowing me to call
some day----Oh! I couldn't face your mother now. I know just how I would
feel myself if I had a daughter who had been accused as I accused you. I
certainly need to take care--as our friend here says."
"I am sure mother would be pleased to meet you," stammered Jess.
"You know, I am Mrs. Prentice. My brother-in-law, Patrick Sarsfield
Prentice, is editor and proprietor of the Centerport _Courier_."
Jess's interest was doubly aroused now. So _this_ was the rich Mrs.
Prentice, whom they said really backed Centerport's newest venture in
the newspaper field?
"My mother has met Mr. Prentice--your brother-in-law," she said,
diffidently. "You know, mother writes. She is Mary Morse."
"Ah, yes," said the lady, preparing to follow Griff out. "I am really
glad to have known you--but I am sorry we began our acquaintance so
unfortunately."
"That--that is all right, Mrs. Prentice," returned the girl.
Griff called back goodnight to her over his shoulder. And at the gate he
parted from the lady whose carelessness had made all the trouble.
"That's just what I told you, Mrs. Prentice," he said. "They're all
right folks, those Morses. Yes, Mrs. Prentice, I'll remember to send all
those things you ordered over in the morning--first delivery," and he
went off, whistling.