Tode nodded. "I'd rather be a soldier like that feller you knew," he
remarked.

A day came when the old man was pronounced well enough to leave the
hospital and the doctor ordered Tode to be on hand to take him home.
The boy did not object. He was rather curious to see the little place
in the rear of the bookstand where the old man lived alone. Since the
accident the stand had been closed and Tode helped to open and air the
room and then made a fire in the stove. When this was done the old man
gave him money to buy materials for supper which of course the boy
shared.

After this he came daily to the place to run errands or do anything
that was wanted, and by degrees the old man came to depend more and
more upon him until the business of the little stand fell almost
wholly into the boy's hands, for the owner's head still troubled him
and he could not think clearly. It was a great relief to him to have
some one to look after everything for him. Tode liked it and the
business prospered in his hands. If he lacked experience, he was
quicker and sharper than the old man. The two took their meals
together, and at night Tode slept on a blanket on the floor, and was
more comfortable and prosperous than he had ever been in his life
before. He had money to spend too, for old Mr. Carey never asked for
any account of the sums that passed through the boy's hands. So he
himself was undisturbed by troublesome questions and figures, the old
man was content now, and each day found him a little weaker and
feebler. Tode noticed this but he gave no thought to the matter. Why
borrow trouble when things were so much to his mind? Tode lived in the
present.