"No," said Duncan gravely, without the flicker of an eyelash: "nothing." Then he smiled cheerfully. "There, that's all right." "To me it's meant everything. I--I only hope I'll be able to repay you some day. God bless you, my boy, God bless you!" He managed to jam his hat awry on his white old head and found his way out, his hands fumbling with one another, his lips moving inaudibly-- perhaps in a prayer of thanksgiving. Motionless, Duncan watched him go, and for several minutes thereafter stood without stirring, lost in thought. Then his quaint, deprecatory grin dawned. He found a handkerchief and mopped his forehead. "Whew!" he whistled. "I wouldn't go through that again for a million dollars." Gradually the smile faded. He puckered his brows and drew down the corners of his mouth. Thoughtfully he ran a hand into his pocket and produced the little crumpled wad of bills of small denominations, representing all he had left in the world. Smoothing them out on the counter, he arranged them carefully, summing up; then returned them to his pocket. "Harry," he observed--"Harry said I couldn't get rid of that stake in a year!... "He doesn't know what a fast town this is!" XIII THE BUSINESS MAN AND MR. BURNHAM It was, perhaps, within the next thirty minutes that Betty (who had been left in charge of the store while Duncan, with coat and collar off and sleeves rolled above his elbows, hacked and pounded and pried and banged at the packing-cases in the backyard) sought him on the scene of his labours. She waited quietly, a little to one side, watching him, until he should become aware of her presence. What she was thinking would have been hard to define, from the inscrutable eyes in her set, tired face of a child. There was no longer any trace of envy, suspicion or resentment in her attitude toward the young man. You might have guessed that she was trying to analyse him, weighing him in the scales of her impoverished and lopsided knowledge of human nature, and wondering if such conclusions as she was able to arrive at were dependable. In the course of time he caught sight of that patient, sad little figure, and, pausing, panting and perspiring under the July sun, cheerfully brandished his weapon from the centre of a widespread area of wreckage and destruction. "Pretty good work for a York dude--not?" he laughed. There was a shadowy smile in her grave eyes. "It's an improvement," she said evenly. He shot her a curious glance. "_Ouch!_" he said thoughtfully. "I just came to tell you," she went on, again immobile, "you're wanted inside." "Somebody wants to see _me?_" he demanded of her retreating back. "Yes." "But who--?" "Blinky Lockwood," she replied over her shoulder, as she went into the house. "Lockwood?" He speculated, for an instant puzzled. Then suddenly: "Father-in-law!" he cried. "Shivering snakes! he mustn't catch me like this! I, a business man!"