d, "I want a
lodging; are there any to be had?"

"I have got a nice bedroom, sir; I'll show you," said the widow; "and
you can have a small sitting-room down-stairs; but I only own the upper
flight of this house."

"Hum! one room would do!--can I board with you?"

"Well, sir, our lodgers don't generally do that, but--"

"Can't take the room unless I do," he interrupted; "I've not come to
London to squander _my_ cash, I can tell you."

There was a struggle in the widow's mind; she sorely wanted money, and
she might not have another chance of letting the room. This grumpy old
man might prove pleasanter on further acquaintance; at any rate he might
not be so disagreeable as many another; and with one glance at her
little sick boy upon the rug, the mother made up her mind and decided to
take her lodger as a boarder.

Mr. Smith was quite satisfied with his room, and though he pretended to
grumble at the price asked for it, he really thought it moderate; so he
unpacked his portmanteau, laid the shirts which Betty had done up so
speedily and well in a drawer, and then sat down once more to read the
letters which he had consulted before knocking at the door of No. 5.
Shall we read them, too? it may, perhaps, give us some clue to the old
man's secret.

The first, as we said before, was written in a trembling hand, and
hardly legible:--

"MY DEAR FATHER,--If I had strength and health to
do it, I would come to you, and never leave off
asking your pardon until you had given it. Father,
I am dying, and these few words are the prayer of
a dying man. It was wrong to leave you, even
though I didn't like the country, and longed for
the great city--it was wrong to leave you all
alone in your sorrow. If Val had lived he would
have been a better son to you than me--may God
forgive me. You will get this, father, when
perhaps it is too late; but if you have any pity,
any love left for your boy, come to me once
more--_once more_, father! I am leaving my wife
and four children quite unprovided for; will you
be a father to them? I do not ask it for _my_
sake, but for their helplessness--the fatherless
and the widow--"

Here the trembling hand had failed, and a blot of ink showed that the
pen had fallen from the writer's hand; it was taken up to add,--