A Penny’s Worth of Character is a lesson in honesty that the reader, young or old, will not easily forget. This delightful story is full of details from Stuart’s; native eastern Kentucky.
Shan Shelton is going to the store for his mother. If he had a dime, he could buy his favorite treat, a chocolate bar and a lemon soda pop.
Shan knows that Mr. Conley, the storekeeper, pays a penny each for good used paper sacks returned to the store. There are ten sacks at home, but Shan’s mother tells him to take only nine to Mr. Conley, because the tenth sack has a hole in it. Shan wants a chocolate bar and lemon soda pop so much, he disobeys his mother and takes the tenth sack.
As he walks to Mr. Conley’s store, Shan delights in his world of morning glories and buttercups, red-headed woodpeckers and crawdads. He carries the sack with the hole in it concealed among the nine good sacks, hoping Mr. Conley won’t notice it. And sure enough, Mr. Conley overlooks it, but as soon as Shan begins to eat his chocolate bar and drink his lemon soda pop, he discovers something is wrong–inside him, and all around him.
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