d heavily down
the stair, and these friends of forty years' standing had said their
last adieu.

The African merchant kept his appointment in the City, but long before
he reached it John Harston had gone also to keep that last terrible
appointment of which the messenger is death.

CHAPTER II.

CHARITY A LA MODE.

It was a dull October morning in Fenchurch Street, some weeks after the
events with which our story opened. The murky City air looked murkier
still through the glazed office windows. Girdlestone, grim and grey, as
though he were the very embodiment of the weather, stooped over his
mahogany table. He had a long list in front of him, on which he was
checking off, as a prelude to the day's work, the position in the market
of the various speculations in which the capital of the firm was
embarked. His son Ezra lounged in an easy chair opposite him, looking
dishevelled and dark under the eyes, for he had been up half the night,
and the Nemesis of reaction was upon him.

"Faugh!" his father ejaculated, glancing round at him with disgust.
"You have been drinking already this morning."

"I took a brandy and seltzer on the way to the office," he answered
carelessly. "I needed one to steady me."

"A young fellow of your age should not want steadying. You have a
strong constitution, but you must not play tricks with it. You must
have been very late last night. It was nearly one before I went to
bed."

"I was playing cards with Major Clutterbuck and one or two others.
We kept it up rather late."

"With Major Clutterbuck?"

"Yes."

"I don't care about your consorting so much with that man. He drinks
and gambles, and does you no good. What good has he ever done himself?
Take care that he does not fleece you." The merchant felt
instinctively, as he glanced at the shrewd, dark face of his son, that
the warning was a superfluous one.

"No fear, father," Ezra answered sulkily; "I am old enough to choose my
own friends."

"Why such a friend as that?"

"I like to know men of that class. You are a successful man, father,
but you--well, you can't be much help to me socially. You need some one
to show you the ropes, and the major is my man. When I can stand alone,
I'll soon let him know it."

"Well, go your own way," said Girdlestone shortly. Hard to all the
world, he was soft only in this one direction. From childhood every
discussion between father and son had ended with the same words.