This business industry of Will’s prospered finely. In July Dr. Meigs gave him three hundred dollars as his share of the profits for six months, and the vegetable garden had also brought in an unusual amount of money; so, for the first time since the father of the family had been lost at sea, the Cardens found themselves in possession of a nice bank account, and were relieved of the little worries that always follow in the wake of poverty.
It was fall, however, before Will and his mother finally decided to tell Mr. Jordan that they would not keep a boarder any longer. He had been with them so long, and his assistance had been so greatly appreciated in the past, that Mrs. Carden felt a natural hesitation in asking him to leave. So Will took the matter into his own hands, and one evening, when Mr. Jordan returned from his walk, the boy stopped him in the little hallway and asked him to step into the sitting room for a moment.
“Perhaps you’ve noticed,” began Will, “that mother has been getting more pale and thin during the last two or three years. Dr. Meigs thinks it’s because she works too hard around the house; and so do I. So we’ve decided not to keep a boarder any longer, but to let mother take it easy, and rest up.”
Mr. Jordan’s spectacled eyes had been fixed calmly upon the young man’s face from the moment he began to speak. Now he gave a scarcely perceptible start, as if astonished at what he heard, and Will was quick to note it.
“We’re very grateful, you know,” he hastened to add, “for all your kindness in the days when we needed help. But my business is prospering pretty well, just now, and I’m laying by a little money; so we think it’s best to relieve mother of all the work we can.”
The man still stared at him, reading coolly and deliberately every line of the boy’s expression.
“I’d like to thank you, also, for all your kindness to my father, in the old days,” continued Will, after a considerable pause. “Dr. Meigs has told me how good you were to him, and how you loaned him money. And you’ve been a good friend to us ever since.”
Still there was no reply. The man neither acknowledged nor denied that he was entitled to such thanks. He stood upright, facing Will as calmly as ever; yet for a brief moment his body swayed from side to side, and then, as if overcome by a powerful effort of will, it stiffened again and was still.