t return at once and find out where I stood.

I left my dinner still unfinished, paying for the whole, of course, and
tossing the waiter a gold piece. I was reckless; I knew not what was
mine and cared not: I must take what I could get and give as I was able;
to rob and to squander seemed the complementary parts of my new destiny.
I walked up Bush Street, whistling, brazening myself to confront Mamie
in the first place, and the world at large and a certain visionary judge
upon a bench in the second. Just outside, I stopped and lighted a cigar
to give me greater countenance; and puffing this and wearing what (I
am sure) was a wretched assumption of braggadocio, I reappeared on the
scene of my disgrace.

My friend and his wife were finishing a poor meal--rags of old mutton,
the remainder cakes from breakfast eaten cold, and a starveling pot of
coffee.

"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Pinkerton," said I. "Sorry to inflict my
presence where it cannot be desired; but there is a piece of business
necessary to be discussed."

"Pray do not consider me," said Mamie, rising, and she sailed into the
adjoining bedroom.

Jim watched her go and shook his head; he looked miserably old and ill.

"What is it, now?" he asked.

"Perhaps you remember you answered none of my questions," said I.

"Your questions?" faltered Jim.

"Even so, Jim. My questions," I repeated. "I put questions as well as
yourself; and however little I may have satisfied Mamie with my answers,
I beg to remind you that you gave me none at all."

"You mean about the bankruptcy?" asked Jim.

I nodded.

He writhed in his chair. "The straight truth is, I was ashamed," he
said. "I was trying to dodge you. I've been playing fast and loose with
you, Loudon; I've deceived you from the first, I blush to own it. And
here you came home and put the very question I was fearing. Why did we
bust so soon? Your keen business eye had not deceived you. That's the
point, that's my shame; that's what killed me this afternoon when Mamie
was treating you so, and my conscience was telling me all the time, Thou
art the man."

"What was it, Jim?" I asked.

"What I had been at all the time, Loudon," he wailed; "and I don't know
how I'm to look you in the face and say it, after my duplicity. It was
stocks," he added in a whisper.

"And you were afraid to tell me that!" I cried. "You poor, old,
cheerless dreamer! what would it matter what you did or didn't? Can't
you see we're doo