The word “still” settled the question with Tommy, and he started up and walked away without another word. He had almost reached the decision to pay a visit to the Lynn fortune-teller, after the example of Lord Dexter. As he hurried home that wish was confirmed, and he fell asleep in the attic to dream of fortune and fame, chariots and poets, and a château overlooking the blue capes of the sea. [Illustration: MACHINERY HALL.] The next morning Tommy arose, and after breakfast started in the direction of Lynn. The first pause in his rapid journey he made at Blingo’s smithy. “Blingo, I’m goin’.” “Do tell!” said Blingo, dropping his hammer. “Well, it may be right, but I don’t feel quite right about it. Still, I would not fly into the face of good fortune. Here, she’ll charge you three shillings for lookin’ into the tea-cup, and I’ll pay my part. Here it is.” Tommy took the money. Then his feet flew along the path by the side of the turnpike. He did not stop again until he reached the fortune-teller’s door. The simple cottage of Moll Pitcher was gay with the last blossoms of a morning-glory vine. Tommy paused to wonder a moment at the pile of variegated bloom, when the small front door opened, and the fortune-teller herself appeared, with an inquiring face. “The frost has spoiled them,” said she, seeing Tommy looking at the morning-glories. “They will all die in a few days; it is a pity. Won’t you come in?” Tommy entered the solitary cottage, and was shown a chair in a simple, plain room. “I’ve come to ask you about something,” he said. “I’m poor. We’re all poor at home, and—and—I—I wish I had money. I’ve come to see if you’ll help me to find some.” “To find some? Mercy, child,— “If I only knew, if I only knew, What do you think that I would do?” She sat down in a patched chair, and rocked to and fro. “They say that you know everything,—all the secrets of the hidden treasures, where the money-pots are, and all,” ventured Tommy. She looked the lad sharply in the face with her keen eyes, then smiled and said:— “If I only knew, if I only knew, What do you think that I would do?” There was another silence, which Tommy ventured to break. “Would you be willing to look into the tea-cup for me? I’ve brought the pay with me.” “What for?” asked the old woman. “To tell me where the pirates hid the money-pot,” said Tommy, his voice trembling. “Mercy on ye, boy,— “If I only knew, if I only knew, What do you think that I would do?” There was another long silence. Tommy was very nervous; he waited until it seemed to him he could wait no longer, and then he asked, faintly, “What _would_ you do, if you only knew?”