might
have it for three cents. 'Have you got two coppers?' said she. 'Let me
see 'em.' He said he had, and showed 'em to her, and she took 'em and
the banana, and then give him five cents, and then she didn't give the
change to me, but put it in her pocket. 'Now,' says she, 'if you'd buy
things that way, you'd be rich in time.'

"When we got to the city we took the elevated and went up town to
Forty-eighth street, and then walked over to her father's house. It was
a big one, on one of the cross streets. When we got there, she told me
to wait a minute, and, lookin' around to see that nobody was comin', she
slipped off the skirt and the cape she had made and rolled 'em up in a
bundle. 'It don't matter about my hat and shoes,' says she, 'but they
wouldn't know me in such duds.' Then, handin' me the bundle, she said,
'For twenty-five cents you can get that bag mended just as good as new,
so you can take it, and it will save us a dollar and a half.'--'No, you
don't,' says I, for I'd had enough of her stinginess. 'I don't touch
that bag ag'in, and I made up my mind that minute to charge the old man
five dollars' worth. When the front door was opened, the servant gal
looked as if she couldn't believe her eyes, but my young woman was as
cool as you please, and she had me showed into a room off the hall, and
then she went up-stairs.

"I sat a-waitin' a long time, which gave me a good chance to look around
at things. The room was real handsome, and I took a peep at the window
fastenin's and the lay of the doors, thinkin' the knowledge might come
in handy some time. Right in front of me on a table was a little yellow
mouse, and it struck me as I looked at it that that must be gold. I
listened if anybody was comin', and then I picked it up to see if it
really was. I thought I heard the door-bell ring just then, and shut it
up in my hand quick, but nobody went to the door; and then I looked at
the little mouse, and if it wasn't pure gold it was the best imitation
ever I see, so I slipped it quietly in my pocket to look at it ag'in
when I had time.

"Pretty soon old Groppeltacker come in, shut the door, and sot down. 'So
you brought my daughter back,' says he.--'Yes,' says I.--'And you expect
to be paid for it,' says he.--'Yes,' says I, 'I do.'--'How much do you
ask for your services?' says he. Now, this was a sort of a staggerer,
for I hadn't made up my mind how much I was goin' to ask; but there
wasn't time for no more thinkin'