did not see his wife."

"That's very likely," rejoined Grossman; "because he never had any
wife."

"He said the little girl was his daughter, and I naturally inferred that
he had a wife," replied Alfred.

"That don't follow of course, my gosling," said the cotton-broker.
"You're green, young man! You're green! I swear, I'd give a good deal
to get sight of Duncan's wench. She must be devilish handsome, or he
wouldn't keep her so close."

Alfred Noble had always felt an instinctive antipathy to this man, who
was often letting fall some remark that jarred harshly with his romantic
ideas of women,--something that seemed to insult the memories of a
beloved mother and sister gone to the spirit-world. But he had never
liked him less than at this moment; for the sly wink of his eye, and
the expressive leer that accompanied his coarse words, were very
disagreeable things to be associated with that charming vision of the
circling doves and the innocent child.


SCENE II.


Time passed away, and with it the average share of changing events.
Alfred Noble became junior partner in the counting-house he had entered
as clerk, and not long afterward the elder partner died. Left thus
to rely upon his own energy and enterprise, the young man gradually