excitement and the other with fear.
They parted at the first thoroughfare, neither having eyes to see nor
hearts to appreciate the touching scene which miles away was taking
place in a little flat not very far from Harlem. An old man, frail in
body, but with a sturdy spirit yet, was looking up from his pillow at
the loving face of a young girl who was bending over him.

"I cannot sleep to-night," he said to her; "I cannot sleep; but that
must not disturb you. I have so many things to think, pleasant things;
but you have only cares, and must rest from them. You look very tired
to-night, tired and worried. Leave me and sleep. I want to see you
bright in the morning."

[Illustration: "_An old man was looking up at the loving face of a young
girl_"]

CHAPTER XI

"_She will go in_"

The next day there was a dearth of assistants in the office. One was
sick, one had pleaded a long-delayed vacation, two had business for the
concern which took them into different quarters of the city, and Mr.
Beers, who was next in authority to Mr. Fellows, had been summoned to
serve on the grand jury. Perhaps it was this knowledge that Mr. Beers
would be absent which had led to the manager's easiness in regard to the
others. For he had been easy, or so Miss Lee thought when she arrived in
the morning and saw the office almost empty. However, it did not trouble
her much. On the contrary, the quiet and non-surveillance of the two
clerks who did the business of the day seemed rather to elate her, and
she went about her work, copying letters and taking down notes with an
alacrity and air of cheerful hope which caused the manager to cast
toward her more than one suspicious look from his desk in the adjoining
room. _He_ was not busy, though he had been the first to arrive that
morning; and he had brought with him a large square package which he had
taken into the room which held the safe. He pretended to be busy, but
any one watching him closely would have noticed that his eyes, and not
his hands, were all that were engaged, and they were anywhere but on his
desk or the letter he appeared to be reading. An observer would also
have noticed that his nervousness was of the extreme sort, and that the
trembling which shook his whole body increased visibly whenever his
glance fell on the door of Mr. Beers's private room, opening at his
back. No one was supposed to be in that room to-day, and had Miss Lee
not been one minute late this especia