This brought him a penny a week, but so heavy were his incidental expenses that he could have saved little for the Muckley had not another organization given him a better chance.  It was a society, newly started, for helping the deserving poor; they had to subscribe not less than a penny weekly to it, and at the end of the year each subscriber was to be given fuel, etc., to the value of double what he or she had put in.  “The three Ps” was a nickname given to the society by Dr. McQueen, because it claimed to distribute “Peats and Potatoes with Propriety,” but he was one of its heartiest supporters nevertheless.  The history of this society in the first months of its existence not only shows how Tommy became a moneyed man, but gives a glimpse into the character of those it benefited.

Miss Ailie was treasurer, and the pennies were to be brought to her on Monday evenings between the hours of seven and eight.  The first Monday evening found her ready in the school-room, in her hand the famous pencil that wrote red with the one end and blue with the other; by her side her assistant, Mr. T. Sandys, a pen balanced on his ear.  For a whole hour did they wait, but though many of the worthiest poor had been enrolled as members, the few who appeared with their pennies were notoriously riff-raff.  At eight Miss Ailie disconsolately sent Tommy home, but he was back in five minutes.

“There’s a mask of them,” he told her, excitedly, “hanging about, but feared to come in because the others would see them.  They’re ashamed to have it kent that they belong to a charity society, and Meggy Robbie is wandering round the Dovecot wi’ her penny wrapped in a paper, and Watty Rattray and Ronny-On is walking up and down the brae pretending they dinna ken one another, and auld Connacher’s Jeanie Ann says she has been four times round the town waiting for Kitty Elshioner to go away, and there’s a one-leggit man hodding in the ditch, and Tibbie Birse is out wi’ a lantern counting them.”

Miss Ailie did not know what to do.  “Here’s Jeanie Ann’s penny,” Tommy continued, opening his hand, “and this is three bawbees frae Kitty Elshioner and you and me is no to tell a soul they’ve joined.”

A furtive tapping was heard at the door.  It was Ronny-On, who had skulked forward with twopence, but Gavinia answered his knock, so he just said, “Ay, Gavinia, it’s yoursel’.  Well, I’ll be stepping,” and would have retired had not Miss Ailie caught him.  Even then he said, “Three bawbees is to you to lay by, and one bawbee to Gavinia no to tell.”

To next Monday evening Miss Ailie now looked with apprehension, but Tommy lay awake that night until, to use a favorite crow of his, he “found a way.”  He borrowed the school-mistress’s blue-and-red pencil and sought the houses of the sensitive poor with the following effect.  One sample will suffice; take him at the door of Meggy Robbie in the West Muir, which he flung open with the effrontery of a tax-collector.