Paul Ford was sitting near the open door.  Thomas Chadwick gazed absently at the Town Park, with its terra-cotta fountains and terraces, and beyond the Park, at the smoke rising from the distant furnaces of Red Cow.  He might have been lost in deep meditation upon the meanings of life; he might have been prevented from hearing Paul Ford’s question by the tremendous noise of the car.  He made no sign.  Then all of a sudden he turned almost fiercely on Paul Ford and glared at him.

“Ye want to know how much she gave me, do ye?” he demanded hotly.

“Yes,” said Paul Ford.

“How much she gave me for taking her that there purse?” Tommy Chadwick temporized.

He was obliged to temporize, because he could not quite resolve to seize the situation and deal with it once for all in a manner favourable to his dignity and to the ideals which he cherished.

“Yes,” said Paul Ford.

“Well, I’ll tell ye,” said Thomas Chadwick—­“though I don’t know as it’s any business of yours.  But, as you’re so curious!...  She didn’t give me anything.  She asked me to have a little refreshment, like the lady she is.  But she knew better than to offer Thomas Chadwick any pecooniary reward for giving her back something as she’d happened to drop.  She’s a lady, she is!”

“Oh!” said Paul Ford.  “It don’t cost much, being a lady!”

“But I’ll tell ye what she did do,” Thomas Chadwick went on, anxious, now that he had begun so well, to bring the matter to an artistic conclusion—­“I’ll tell ye what she did do.  She give me a sovereign apiece for my grandsons—­my eldest daughter’s twins.”  Then, after an effective pause:  “Ye can put that in your pipe and smoke it!...  A sovereign apiece!”

“And have you handed it over?” Paul Ford inquired mildly, after a period of soft whistling.

“I’ve started two post-office savings bank accounts for ’em,” said Thomas Chadwick, with ferocity.

The talk stopped, and nothing whatever occurred until the car halted at the railway station to take up passengers.  The heart of Thomas Chadwick gave a curious little jump when he saw Mrs Clayton Vernon coming out of the station and towards his car. (Her horses must have been still lame or her coachman still laid aside.) She boarded the car, smiling with a quite particular effulgence upon Thomas Chadwick, and he greeted her with what he imagined to be the true antique chivalry.  And she sat down in the corner opposite to Paul Ford, beaming.

When Thomas Chadwick came, with great respect, to demand her fare, she said: 

“By the way, Chadwick, it’s such a short distance from the station to the town, I think I should have walked and saved a penny.  But I wanted to speak to you.  I wasn’t aware, last Tuesday, that your other daughter got married last year and now has a dear little baby.  I gave you threepenny bits each for those dear little twins.  Here’s another one for the other baby, I think I ought to treat all your grandchildren alike—­otherwise your daughters might be jealous of each other”—­she smiled archly, to indicate that this passage was humorous—­“and there’s no knowing what might happen!”