our child. Guard her above all from
those who would wreck her young life in order to share her fortune.
Do this, old friend, and make me happy on my deathbed."

The merchant made no answer. His heavy eyebrows were drawn down, and
his forehead all puckered with thought.

"You are the one man," continued the sufferer, "whom I know to be just
and upright. Give me the water, for my mouth is dry. Should, which God
forbid, my dear girl perish before she marries, then--" His breath
failed him for a moment, and he paused to recover it.

"Well, what then?"

"Then, old friend, her fortune reverts to you, for there is none who
will use it so well. Those are the terms of the will. But you will
guard her and care for her, as I would myself. She is a tender plant,
John, too weak to grow alone. Promise me that you will do right by
her--promise it?"

"I do promise it," John Girdlestone answered in a deep voice. He was
standing up now, and leaning over to catch the words of the dying man.

Harston was sinking rapidly. With a feeble motion he pointed to a
brown-backed volume upon the table.

"Take up the book," he said.

The merchant picked it up.

"Now, repeat after me, I swear and solemnly pledge myself--"

"I swear and solemnly pledge myself--

"To treasure and guard as if she were my own--" came the tremulous voice
from the bed.

"To treasure and guard as if she were my own--" in the deep bass of the
merchant.

"Kate Harston, the daughter of my deceased friend--"

"Kate Harston, the daughter of my deceased friend--"

"And as I treat her, so may my own flesh and blood treat me!"

"And as I treat her, so may my own flesh and blood treat me!"

The sick man's head fell back exhausted upon his pillow. "Thank God!"
he muttered, "now I can die in peace."

"Turn your mind away from the vanities and dross of this world," John
Girdlestone said sternly, "and fix it upon that which is eternal, and
can never die."

"Are you going?" the invalid asked sadly, for he had taken up his hat
and stick.

"Yes, I must go; I have an appointment in the City at six, which I must
not miss."

"And I have an appointment which I must not miss," the dying man said
with a feeble smile.

"I shall send up the nurse as I go down," Girdlestone said.
"Good-bye!"

"Good-bye! God bless you, John!"

The firm, strong hand of the hale man enclosed for a moment the feeble,
burning one of the sufferer. Then John Girdlestone plodde