val to the village the father of Charley Millard died, and the
store, which had not been very successful, was sold to another. Charley
left the counter to take a course in the high school, doing odd jobs in
the mean while.

When young Millard was eighteen years old he came into what was a great
fortune in village eyes. His father's more fortunate brother, who had
amassed money as a dealer in country produce in Washington street, New
York, died, leaving the profits of all his years of toil over eggs and
butter, Bermuda potatoes and baskets of early tomatoes, to his two
nephews, Charley Millard and Charley's elder brother, Richard. After the
lawyers, the surrogate, the executor, and the others had taken each his
due allowance out of it, there may have been fifty or seventy-five
thousand dollars apiece left for the two young men. Just how much it was
the village people never knew, for Charley was not prone to talk of his
own affairs, and Dick spent his share before he fairly had time to
calculate what it amounted to. When Richard had seen the last of his
money, and found himself troubled by small debts, he simplified matters
by executing a "mysterious disappearance," dropping out of sight of his
old associates as effectually as though he had slipped into some
cosmical crack. Charley, though nominally subject to a guardian, managed
his own affairs, husbanded his money, paid Dick's debts, and contrived
to take up the bank stock and other profitable securities that his
brother had hypothecated. He lived with his mother till she died, and
then he found himself at twenty-one with money enough to keep him at
ease, and with no family duty but that which his mother had laid upon
him of finding the recreant Dick if possible, and helping him to some
reputable employment--again if possible.

In Cappadocia Charley's little fortune made him the beau of the town;
the "great catch," in the slang phrase of the little society of the
village--a society in which there were no events worth reckoning but
betrothals and weddings. In such a place leisure is productive of little
except ennui. To get some relief from the fatigue of moving around a
circle so small, and to look after his investments, Charley made a visit
to New York a month after the death of his mother. His affection for his
mother was too fresh for him to neglect her sister, who was the wife of
a mechanic living in Avenue C. He would have preferred to go to a hotel,
but he took u