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 “Sorry to tell you, Peter, you are not back in time to get the Tomwit place.”

Peter came out of his musing over the Boston banks with a sense of bewilderment.

“How's that? why, I bought that land—”

“But you paid nothing for your option, Siner.”

“I had a clear-cut understanding with Mr. Tomwit—”

Mr. Hooker smiled a smile that brought out sharp wrinkles around the thin nose on his thin face.

“You should have paid him an earnest, Siner, if you wanted to bind your trade. You colored folks are always stumbling over the law.”

Peter stared through the grating, not knowing what to do.

“I'll go see Mr. Tomwit,” he said, and started uncertainly for the door.

The cashier's falsetto stopped him:

“No use, Peter. Mr. Tomwit surprised me, too, but no use talking about it. I didn't like to see such an important thing as the education of our colored people held up, myself. I've been thinking about it.”

“Especially when I had made a fair square trade,” put in Peter, warmly.

“Exactly,” squeaked the cashier. “And rather than let your project be delayed, I'm going to offer you the old Dillihay place at exactly the same price, Peter—eight hundred.”

“The Dillihay place?”