er need. Will you take
the star, dear lady nurse?"

"No," said Miss Stella, gently; "though I thank you for your generous
thought of me, my good friend. But I have a better and a wiser investment
for you. Have you forgotten this?" She took Dan's medal from the bag on
her wrist.

"By George, I _did_ forget it!" said the old man. "Somehow, it slipped my
memory completely in our pleasant hurry. Poor Jack Farley's medal! You've
found the chap that owns it, you say?"

"Yes," was the answer--"a brave, sturdy, honest little chap, who stood by
your poor old friend in his last lonely days, and helped him in his last
lonely cruise, and took the medal from his dying hands as the last and
only legacy he had to give. Would you consider him Jack Farley's heir,
Captain Carleton?"

"Most certainly I would," was the rejoinder.

"Then make him his heir," she said softly.

"Eh!--what? I don't understand," muttered the old gentleman.

Then Miss Stella explained. It was such an explanation as only gentle
speakers like Miss Stella can make. She told about bright, brave, plucky
Dan and Aunt Winnie, of the scholarship at St. Andrew's and of the Little
Sisters of the Poor. She told of the attic home over the Mulligans' for
which Aunt Winnie was "pining," and of the dreams that Dan dreamed.

"It would seem a pity," Miss Stella said, "for him to give up and go
down."

"By George, he must not,--he shall not!" said the old sailor. "You want me
to do something for him? Out with it, my lady!"

"Yes. I want you to invest, not in diamond stars, Captain, but in Jack
Farley's medal. I was to negotiate the sale, you know."

"Yes, yes! And you warned me you were going to fleece me; so go on,--go
on! What is the boy's--what is your price?" asked the Captain.

"A pension," said Miss Stella, softly, "the pension you would give Jack
Farley--if he were here to claim it,--just the little pension an old
sailor would ask for his last watch below. It will hold the little nest
under the eaves that Danny calls home for the old aunt that he loves; it
will steady the young wings for their flight to the stars; it will keep
the young heart brave and pure and warm as only love and home can."

"You're right,--you're right,--you're always right, dear lady! If old Jack
were here, I'd pension him, as you say, and fling in a little extra for
his grog and his pipe. Old Jack could have counted on me for four or five
hundred a year. But a sturdy, strapping young ch