urs, uncle?"

"It--is," and "isn't" hung in the balance.

"It is not?" Rhoda dressed the question for him in the terror of
contemptuous horror.

"It is. I--of course it is; how could it help being mine? My money? Yes.
What sort o' thing's that to ask--whether what I've got's mine or yours,
or somebody else's? Ha!"

"And you say you are not rich, uncle?"

A charming congratulatory smile was addressed to him, and a shake of the
head of tender reproach irresistible to his vanity.

"Rich! with a lot o' calls on me; everybody wantin' to borrow--I'm rich!
And now you coming to me! You women can't bring a guess to bear upon the
right nature o' money."

"Uncle, you will decide to help me, I know."

She said it with a staggering assurance of manner.

"How do you know?" cried Anthony.

"Why do you carry so much money about with you in bags, uncle?"

"Hear it, my dear." He simulated miser's joy.

"Ain't that music? Talk of operas! Hear that; don't it talk? don't it
chink? don't it sing?" He groaned "Oh, Lord!" and fell back.

This transition from a state of intensest rapture to the depths of pain
alarmed her.

"Nothing; it's nothing." Anthony anticipated her inquiries. "They bags is
so heavy."

"Then why do you carry them about?"

"Perhaps it's heart disease," said Anthony, and grinned, for he knew the
soundness of his health.

"You are very pale, uncle."

"Eh? you don't say that?"

"You are awfully white, dear uncle."

"I'll look in the glass," said Anthony. "No, I won't." He sank back in
his chair. "Rhoda, we're all sinners, ain't we? All--every man and woman
of us, and baby, too. That's a comfort; yes, it is a comfort. It's a
tremendous comfort--shuts mouths. I know what you're going to say--some
bigger sinners than others. If they're sorry for it, though, what then?
They can repent, can't they?"

"They must undo any harm they may have done. Sinners are not to repent
only in words, uncle."

"I've been feeling lately," he murmured.

Rhoda expected a miser's confession.

"I've been feeling, the last two or three days," he resumed.

"What, uncle?"

"Sort of taste of a tremendous nice lemon in my mouth, my dear, and liked
it, till all of a sudden I swallowed it whole--such a gulp! I felt it
just now. I'm all right."

"No, uncle," said Rhoda: "you are not all right: this money makes you
miserable. It does; I can see that it does. Now, put those bags in my
hands. For a minute, try; it will do you