"I hope you have received no injury, sir," said Mr. Harding,
respectfully, addressing the stranger he had rescued.

"No, my worthy friend; thanks to your timely assistance. The rascal
nearly succeeded, however."

"I hope you have lost nothing, sir."

"Nothing, fortunately. You can form an idea of the value of your
interference, when I say that I have fifteen hundred dollars with me,
all of which would doubtless have been taken."

"I am glad," said Timothy, "that I was able to do you such a service. It
was by the merest chance that I came this way."

"Will you add to my indebtedness by accompanying me with that trusty
club of yours? I have some distance yet to go, and the money I have with
me I don't want to lose."

"Willingly," said the cooper.

"But I am forgetting," continued the gentleman, "that you will yourself
be obliged to return alone."

"I do not carry enough money to make me fear an attack," said Mr.
Harding, laughing. "Money brings care, I have always heard, and the want
of it sometimes freedom from anxiety."

"Yet most people are willing to take their share of that."