He stepped close to Thomas Payne and extended it.
"What is it ?" asked the young man.
Silas smiled up in his face with the ingenuous smile of a child.
"What is it ?" Thomas Payne asked again.
The others crowded around.
"It's nothin' but the bill," replied Silas, in a wheedling whisper.
His dry old face turned red, his smile deepened.
"The bill for what ?" demanded Thomas Payne, and he seized the paper.
"For the cherries you eat," replied Silas.

"I've always been in the habit of chargin' more, but I've took off a leetle this time." His voice had a ring of challenge, his eyes were sharp, while his mouth smiled.
Thomas Payne scowled over the bill.

The other young men peered at it over his shoulder, and repeated the amount with whistles and half-laughs of scorn and anger.

The girls ejaculated to each other in whispers.

Silas stood impervious, waiting.
The young men whipped out their purses without a word, but Thomas motioned them back.