ntime, just grin and bear it;
you'll not die, you know, you'll only get thinner. I _have_ heard that
a bit o' boiled shoe-leather ain't a bad thing to keep one easy till
relief comes."

"Dear me!" exclaimed Mr Auberly in the distance, and bustling back as
lie spoke; "I quite forgot; how stupid of me! I was directed by my
daughter to give you this."

He took a ten-pound note from his purse, and put it into the fairy's
hand.

"This is from Louisa," he continued, "and I may add that it is the
savings from her pocket-money. I did not wish the dear child to part
with it, and said I would give it to you from myself; but she was so
urgent, and seemed so distressed when I refused my consent, that I gave
in; so you have to thank my daughter, not me."

Mr Auberly smiled and nodded as he turned to go, and there was really
very little grimness in the smile on this occasion--very little indeed!
Willie also nodded with great violence and frequency; he likewise winked
with one eye, and otherwise sought to indicate that there were within
him sundry deep and not easily expressed thoughts and feelings, which
were, upon the whole, of a satisfactory nature.

As for the fairy, she never once smiled or thanked Mr Auberly, but
simply stared at him with her lustrous eyes open to their very widest,
and she continued to stare at the door, as though she saw him through
it, for some time after they were gone. Then she turned suddenly to the
wall, thanked God, and burst into tears--glad tears, such as only those
can weep who have unexpectedly found relief when their extremity was
greatest.

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.

A CHANGE IN FORTUNE.

There is nothing more surprising in regard to sublunary matters than the
way in which unexpected events arise out of what may be called
unintentional causes.

When David Boone and his friend Gorman planned the insurance and
destruction of the toy shop and its contents, they no more expected that
the very first steps towards that end would result in the conversion of
a poor into a flourishing business, than they expected that the
expression of a wish would convert Poorthing Lane into Beverly Square;
yet so it was.

Poor David was rendered so desperate by his straits, and so anxious to
escape from the crime into which his friend sought to plunge him, that
he meditated suicide; but, lacking the courage to accomplish this, he
relieved his feelings by carrying out the details of his business and
the p