“I don’t want it myself.  I never shall touch a dollar of it for my own use,” said she resolutely.

“All very fine now.  But wait till you get superannuated, or such a cripple with rheumatism that you can’t hobble to that schoolhouse, which you seem to love better than your own soul.  Wait till then, I say, and see whether some of this money will not be very acceptable.”

“That time will never come, sir; never!” answered Beulah, laughing.

“Beulah Benton, you are a simpleton!” said he, looking affectionately at her from beneath his shaggy brows.

“I want that money, sir.”

“You shall not have one cent of it.  The idea of your playing Lady Bountiful to the Graysons!  Pshaw! not a picayune shall you have.”

“Oh, sir, it would make me so very happy to aid them.  You cannot conceive how much pleasure it would afford me.”

“Look here, child; all that sort of angelic disinterestedness sounds very well done up in a novel, but the reality is quite another matter.  Mrs. Grayson treated you like a brute; and it is not to be expected that you will have any extraordinary degree of affection for her.  Human nature is spiteful and unforgiving; and as for your piling coals of fire on her head to the amount of nine thousand dollars, that is being entirely too magnanimous!”

“I want to make Mrs. Grayson amends, sir.  Once, when I was maddened by sorrow and pain, I said something which I always repented bitterly.”  As Beulah spoke, a cloud swept across her face.

“What was it, child? what did you say?”

“I cursed her! besought God to punish her severely for her unkindness to me.  I hardly knew what I was saying; but even then it shocked me, and I prayed God to forgive my passion.  I shudder when I remember it.  I have forgiven her heartlessness long ago; and now, sir, I want you to give me that money.  If it is mine at all, it is mine to employ as I choose.”

“Cornelia did not leave the legacy to the Graysons.”

“Were she living, she would commend the use I am about to make of it.  Will you give me five thousand dollars of it?”

“Oh, Beulah, you are a queer compound! a strange being!”

“Will you give me five thousand dollars of that money tomorrow?” persisted Beulah, looking steadily at him.

“Yes, child; if you will have it so.”  His voice trembled, and he looked at the orphan with moist eyes.

Mrs. Asbury had taken no part in the conversation, but her earnest face attested her interest.  Passing her arm around Beulah’s waist, she hastily kissed her brow, and only said: 

“God bless you, my dear, noble Beulah!”