They are my
private property, but I am determined that no reproach shall fall upon
the bank, and it is my intention that they shall be placed at your
disposal. Kindly examine them. Richard, you may go--but stay, what is
this? Great Heavens!"
Evidently his eyes had roamed down the page his wife had written, even
while he was speaking, and something had caught his eye that gave him a
terrible shock.
Dick waited.
He saw the banker continue to read, his eyes enlarged, and his breath
suspended for the moment.
Then he felt his hand tenderly taken, and himself brought face to face
with the agitated banker, who looked at him as Dick had never seen a man
look before.
"God bless you, my dear boy!" he said, in trembling and hoarse tones;
"it must have been a premonition that caused me to believe in you, and
send you on that message. Gentlemen, listen to me. I wish you to do
honor to this brave lad, but for whose valor and promptness I might at
this moment be mourning the loss of my house, and perhaps even worse,
for both the wife and daughter were in peril. Did you ever know of a
more especial favor of Providence than the fact of his being at the door
of my house just when an explosion and a fire imperiled all I hold dear
in the world?"
They crowded around, asking questions, and reading, the note which Mrs.
Gibbs had sent; for the time being even the peril of the bank was a
secondary consideration.
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