Was he dreaming?
It seemed to him that he had gone back many years; that he was a poor
young man again, entering upon his first struggle for a foothold in the
crowded, selfish, unhomelike metropolis. He remembered the day when
_he_ had worn shoes like these.

He sent out for an assortment of new ones, from which, with unnecessary
lavishness, he chose and kept three or four pairs. All the rest of the
day, nevertheless, those sorry Congress boots of Crombie's, which he
had directed his office-boy to place beside the soft-coal fire, for
drying, faced him with a sort of haunting look. However much he might
be occupied with weightier matters, he could not keep his eyes from
straying in that direction; and whenever they rested on that battered
"right" and that way-worn "left," turned up in that mute, appealing
repose and uselessness at the fender, his thoughts recurred to his
early years of trial and poverty. Ah! how greatly he had changed since
then! On some accounts he could almost wish that he were poor again.
But when he remembered Blanche, he was glad, for her sake, that he was
rich.

But if for her sake, why not for others? Perhaps he had been rather
selfish, not only about Blanche, but toward her. His conscience began
to reproach him. Had he made for her a large life? Since her mother's
premature death, had he instilled into her sympathies, tastes,
companionships that would make her existence the richer? Had he not
kept her too much to himself? On the other hand, he had gratified all
her material wants; she could wear what she pleased, she could go where
she chose, she had acquaintances of a sort becoming to the daughter of
a wealthy man. Yet there was something lacking. What did she know about
old, used-up boots and all that pertains to them? What did she know
about indigence, real privation, and brave endurance, such as a hundred
thousand fellow-creatures all around her were undergoing?

Somehow it dawned upon the old banker that if she knew about all these
things and had some share in them, albeit only through sympathy and
helping, she might be happier, more truly a woman, than she was now.

As he sat alone, in revery, he actually heaved a deep sigh. A sigh is
often as happy a deliverance as a laugh, in this world of sorrows. It
was the first that had escaped Littimer in years. Let us say that it
was a breathing space, which gave him time for reflection; it marked
the turning of a leaf; it was the beginning of