What taste she has, and what an ear! No one notices the points in my singing as she does; and how she did turn that carpet in Gifford's room; dear me!" He sat clutching his extinguished pipe for many minutes, when suddenly a gleam came into his face, and the anxious look began to disappear.
He rose, and laid his pipe upon the mantelpiece, first carefully knocking the ashes into the wood-box which stood beside the stove.

Then, standing with his left foot wrapped about his right ankle and his face full of suppressed eagerness, he felt in each pocket of his waistcoat, and produced first a knife, then a tape measure, a pincushion, a bunch of keys, and last a large, worn copper cent.

It was smooth with age, but its almost obliterated date still showed that it had been struck the year of Mr.Denner's birth.
Next, he spread his pocket handkerchief smoothly upon the floor, and then, a little stiffly, knelt upon it.

He rubbed the cent upon the cuff of his coat to make it shine, and held it up a moment in the stream of wintry sunshine that poured through the office window and lay in a golden square on the bare floor.
"Heads," said Mr.Denner,--"heads shall be Miss Deborah; tails, Miss Ruth.

Oh, dear me! I wonder which ?" As he said this, he pitched the coin with a tremulous hand, and then leaned forward, breathlessly watching it fall, waver from side to side, and roll slowly under the bookcase.