dger's face that she had never seen in it before.

"I hope I've not offended you, sir," said the woman, recovering her
self-possession, and looking a little too ready to take offense on her
side, at a moment's notice.

"Far from it, ma'am, far from it!" he rejoined, in a strangely
eager, hurried way. "I have just remembered something--something very
important. I must go upstairs--it's a letter, a letter, a letter. I'll
come back to my tea, ma'am. I beg your pardon, I'm much obliged to you,
you've been very kind--I'll say good-by, if you'll allow me, for the
present." To the landlady's amazement, he cordially shook hands with
her, and made for the door, leaving tea and tea-pot to take care of
themselves.

The moment he reached his own room, he locked himself in. For a little
while he stood holding by the chimney-piece, waiting to recover his
breath. The moment he could move again, he opened his writing-desk on
the table. "That for you, Mr. Pedgift and Son!" he said, with a snap of
his fingers as he sat down. "I've got a son too!"

There was a knock at the door--a knock, soft, considerate, and
confidential. The anxious landlady wished to know whether Mr. Bashwood
was ill, and begged to intimate for the second time that she earnestly
trusted she had given him no offense.

"No! no!" he called through the door. "I'm quite well--I'm writing,
ma'am, I'm writing--please to excuse me. She's a good woman; she's an
excellent woman," he thought, when the landlady had retired. "I'll make
her a little present. My mind's so unsettled, I might never have thought
of it but for her. Oh, if my boy is at the office still! Oh, if I can
only write a letter that will make him pity me!"

He took up his pen, and sat thinking anxiously, thinking long, before he
touched the paper. Slowly, with many patient pauses to think and think
again, and with more than ordinary care to make his writing legible, he
traced these lines:

"MY DEAR JAMES--You will be surprised, I am afraid, to see my
handwriting. Pray don't suppose I am going to ask you for money, or to
reproach you for having sold me out of house and home when you forfeited
your security, and I had to pay. I am willing and anxious to let
by-gones be by-gones, and to forget the past.

"It is in your power (if you are still at the Private Inquiry Office) to
do me a great service. I am in sore anxiety and trouble on the subject
of a person in whom I am interested. The person is a lady. P