Mel found a wallet on her way back home. She picked it up and looked inside. Five hundred dollars! Mel thought about the bike she wanted. She had asked her mom for one, which would cost 460 dollars, but her mom said they had no money. Mel looked around. No one had seen her with the wallet. She put it into her schoolbag and ran home fast.

When she got home, she put the wallet in her treasure box. However, there was one problem. How could she tell her parents about it? Then Mel remembered the prize of the science competition was five hundred dollars. She would tell her parents she had won it.

The next day, Mel rushed home from school. She was just about to tell her mother the good news when her mother said, “I have enough money left over this week for a treat. I’ve bought some strawberries. You can have one.” Mel’s news darted (猛冲) back inside her, like a moth (飞蛾) into a dark corner. What would happen if her mother lost her wallet and someone kept it? They might not have any food for weeks! Mel ran to her room. She opened the treasure box and took the wallet to her mother.

“I found this,” she said. “It has five hundred dollars in it.”

“Wow!” said her mother. “Five hundred dollars!”

She looked inside the wallet. “It could be Mrs. Maka’s,” she said. “We’ll have to take it to her right now.”

Mrs. Maka was very pleased to get her wallet back. “This money is to get my eyes fixed, or I will go blind,” she said. She gave twenty dollars to Mel, but Mel refused.

After that, Mel and Mrs. Maka became good friends. Mel helped Mrs. Maka make a garden and Mrs. Maka showed Mel how to make clay pots (陶罐). One day, Mrs. Maka said, “Mel, my clay pot won a prize—1,000 dollars and a red bike! I can’t ride a bike. Would you like it?”