n to take upon himself the task of providing for the
expenses of the house, and the medical attendance of the sick man.

It would have been much easier for Leo to fail in his assumed task than
for Maggie to do so. Even a young man of so much importance as
Fitzherbert Wittleworth, upon whom the salvation of the great house of
Checkynshaw, Hart, & Co. seemed to depend, toiled for the meagre
pittance of five dollars a week. Leo had some acquaintance with the
late clerk in the private office of the banker, and he had listened
with wonder to the astounding achievements of Fitz in the postal and
financial departments of the house. Of course Mr. Wittleworth would be
a partner in the concern as soon as he was twenty-one, if not before;
for, besides his own marvellous abilities, he had the additional
advantage of being a relative of the distinguished head of the concern.

Leo was abashed at his own insignificance when he stood in the presence
of the banker's clerk. If such an astonishing combination of talent as
Mr. Wittleworth possessed could be purchased for five dollars a week,
what could he, who was only a mere tinker, expect to obtain? Half that
sum would have been an extravagant valuation of his own services, under
ordinary circumstances. But beneath the burden which now rested upon
him, he felt an inspiration which had never before fired his soul; he
felt called upon to perform a miracle.

He was born with a mechanical genius, and he felt it working within
him. There was no end of wooden trip-hammers, saw-mills, and other
working machines he had invented and constructed. Under the pressure of
the present necessity he felt able to accomplish better things.
Something must be done which would produce fifteen, or at least ten,
dollars a week. It was no use to think it couldn't be done; it must be
done. It looked like a species of lunacy on his part to flatter himself
that it was possible to make even more than a journeyman mechanic's
wages.

Leo had in his busy brain half a dozen crude plans of simple machines.
Often, when he saw people at work, he tried to think how the labor
might be done by machinery. As he sat in the kitchen, where Maggie was
sewing or preparing the dinner, he was devising a way to perform the
task with wood and iron. Only a few days before the illness of the
barber, he had seen her slicing potatoes to fry, and the operation had
suggested a potato slicer, which would answer equally well for
cucumbers,