ow with a vengeance! He might do what he liked, go where
he liked, starve where he liked.

He wandered up and down the streets that winter evening recklessly
indifferent to what became of him. The shops were gaily lighted and
adorned with Christmas decorations. Boys and girls, men and women,
thronged them, eager in their purchases and radiant in the prospect of
the coming festival. There went a grave father, parading the pavement
with a football under his arm for the boy at home; and here a lad, with
his mother's arm in his, stood halted before an array of fur cloaks, and
bade her choose the best among them. Bright-eyed school-girls brushed
past him with their brothers, smiling and talking in holiday glee; and
here a trio of school-chums, arm-in-arm, bore down upon him, laughing
over some last-term joke. He watched them all.

Times were when his heart would warm and soften within him at the
memories sights like these inspired; but they were nothing to him now;
or if they were anything, they were part of a universal conspiracy to
mock him. Let them mock him; what cared he?

The night drew on. One by one the gay lights in the shops went out, and
the shutters hid the crowded windows. One by one the passengers
dispersed, some to besiege the railway-stations, some to invade the
trams, others to walk in cheery parties by the frosty roads; all to go
home.

Even the weary shopmen and shop-girls, released from the day's labours,
hurried past him homeward, and the sleepy cabman whipped up his horse
for his last fare before going home, and the tramps and beggars vanished
down their alleys, and sought every man his home.

Home! The word had no meaning to-night for Reginald as he watched the
streets empty, and found himself a solitary wayfarer in the deserted
thoroughfares.

The hum of traffic ceased. One by one the bedroom lights went out, the
clocks chimed midnight clearly in the frosty air, and still he wandered
on.

He passed a newspaper-office, where the thunder of machinery and the
glare of the case-room reminded him of his own bitter apprenticeship at
the _Rocket_. They might find him a job here if he applied. Faugh! who
would take a gaol-bird, a "let-off" swindler, into their employ?

He strolled down to the docks. The great river lay asleep. The docks
were, deserted; the dockyards silent. Only here and there a darting
light, or the distant throb of an engine, broke the slumber of the
scene.

A ma