He could hardly be made to believe that the hearty-looking, comfortably-dressed man whom he found in Mr.Benedict was the same whom he had left many months before in the rags of a pauper and the emaciation of a feeble convalescent.

The latter expressed to Mike the obligations he felt for the service which Jim informed him had been rendered by the good-natured Irishman, and Mike blushed while protesting that it was "nothing at all, at all," and thinking of the hundred dollars that he earned so easily.
"Did ye know, Jim," said Mike, to change the subject, "that owld Belcher has gone to New Yorrk to live ?" "No." "Yis, the whole kit an' boodle of 'em is gone, an' the purty man wid 'em." "Hallelujer!" roared Jim.
"Yis, and be gorry he's got me hundred dollars," said Mike.
"What did ye gi'en it to 'im for, Mike?
I didn't take ye for a fool." "Well, ye see, I wint in for ile, like the rist of 'em.

Och! ye shud 'ave seen the owld feller talk! 'Mike,' says he, 'ye can't afford to lose this,' says he.

'I should miss me slape, Mike,' says he, 'if it shouldn't all come back to ye.' 'An' if it don't,' says I, 'there'll be two uv us lyin' awake, an' ye'll have plinty of company; an' what they lose in dhraimin' they'll take out in cussin',' says I.'Mike,' says he, 'ye hadn't better do it, an' if ye do, I don't take no resk;' an' says I, 'they're all goin' in, an' I'm goin' wid 'em.' 'Very well,' says he, lookin' kind o' sorry, and then, be gorry, he scooped the whole pile, an' barrin' the ile uv his purty spache, divil a bit have I seen more nor four dollars." "Divil a bit will ye see agin," said Jim, shaking his head.

"Mike, ye're a fool." "That's jist what I tell mesilf," responded Mike; "but there's betther music nor hearin' it repaited; an' I've got betther company in it, barrin' Mr.Benedict's presence, nor I've got here in me own house." Jim, finding Mike a little sore over his loss, refrained from further allusion to it; and Mr.Benedict declared himself ready for bed.