“Christina was delighted—­she took the money—­she had never seen so large an amount before—­she handed it to her mother; and both were profuse in their thanks, while the crowd vigorously applauded the good and generous manager.

“‘But this is not all,’ he continued; ’instead of five dollars per week, the sum we had agreed upon, for your singing, I shall pay you hereafter fifty dollars a week!’

“There was still greater applause; Christina’s eyes swam with happiness; her mother began to cry; Christina seized the manager’s hand, and the old scamp posed, as he received the thanks of those present, as if all this were the outcome of his own generosity, and as if he were indeed the best and noblest of men.  I have no doubt that if I had not interfered he would have kept her on the five dollars a week, and the silly little soul would have been satisfied.

“I followed them home.  I again listened to their happiness.  And then I heard the mother tell the father that they must both go out to-morrow and find a better place to lodge in, for they were rich now.  A bright thought flashed across my mind, and I hastened away.

“The next morning, at daybreak, I hurried to the same detective I had employed the day before; he was a shrewd, but not unkindly fellow.  I explained to him my plans, and we went out together.  We took a carriage and drove rapidly from place to place; he really seemed pleased to find himself engaged, for once in his life, in a good action.  What I did will be revealed as I go on with this story.

“At half past eight o’clock that morning the Jansen family had finished their breakfast and talked over and over again, for the twentieth time, their wonderful turn of fortune, and all its incidents, including repeated counting of their marvelous hoard of money.  Then Christina was left in charge of the children, and the father and mother sallied forth to look for a new residence.  The neighbors crowded around to congratulate them; and they explained,—­for, kindly-hearted souls, they did not wish their old companions in poverty to think that they had willingly fled from them, at the first approach of good fortune,—­they explained that they must get a new home nearer to the theater, for Christina’s sake; and that they proposed that she should have teachers in music and singing and acting; for she was now the bread-winner of the family, and they hoped that some day she would shine in opera with the great artists.

“Did the neighbors know of any place, suitable for them, which they could rent?

“No, they did not; they rarely passed out of their own poor neighborhood.

“But here a plainly dressed man, who looked like a workman, and who had been listening to the conversation, spoke up and said that he had observed, only that morning, a bill of ‘To Rent’ upon a very neat little house, only a few blocks from the theater; and, as he was going that way, he would be glad to show them the place.  They thanked him; and, explaining to him that the business of renting houses was something new to them, for heretofore they had lived in one or two rooms—­they might have added, very near the roof—­they walked off with the stranger.  He led them into a pleasant, quiet, respectable neighborhood, and at last stopped before a small, neat three-story house, with a little garden in front and another larger one in the rear.