You must not go alone," remarked Henry, taking up the cap he had a few
minutes before laid off.

"Wait for supper. It is all ready," said Mrs. Ellis. "Don't go out
until you have eaten something."

"No time is to be lost, mother," replied Kate. "And, then, I haven't
the least appetite."

"But your brother has been working hard all day, and is, of course,
tired and hungry."

"Oh, I forgot," said Kate. "But Henry needn't go with me. If he will
only tell me exactly where I can find father, that will be enough. I
think I'd better see him alone."

"Food would choke me now." Henry's voice was husky and tremulous.
"Come, sister," he added, after a pause, "if this work is done at all,
it must be done quickly."

Without a word more on either part, the brother and sister left the
room, and started on their errand.

CHAPTER XXI.

LATE in the afternoon of the day on which occurred the incidents
mentioned in the preceding chapter, Mr. Wilkinson, who had entirely
recovered from his embarrassed condition, and who was now a sober man
in every sense of the word, as well as a thrifty merchant, was standing
at one of the counters in his large, well filled store, when a
miserable looking creature entered and came back to where he stood.

"Good-day, Mr. Wilkinson," said the new-comer.

Surprise kept the merchant silent for some moments, when the other
said--

"You don't know me, I presume."

"Henry Ellis!" exclaimed Wilkinson. "Is it possible you have fallen so
low?"

"Just as you see me," was replied.

"You ought to be more of a man than this. You ought to have more
strength of character," said Wilkinson, giving utterance to the first
thought that came into his mind.

"Oh, yes; it is easy to talk," replied Ellis, with a slight impatience
of manner. "But you know my history as well almost as I know it myself.
I was driven to ruin."

"How so?"

"Why do you ask the question?"

"You refer to your wife?"

"Of course I do. She drove me to destruction."

"That is a hard saying, Mr. Ellis."

"Yet true as that the sun shines. And she has had her reward!"

This last sentence was uttered in a tone of self-satisfaction that
deeply pained Mr. Wilkinson.

"I saw your wife this morning," he remarked, after a moment's silence.

"You did! Where?"

"I passed her in the street; and the sight of her made my heart ache.
Ah, my friend! if you have been wronged, deeply is the wrong repaid!
Such a wreck! I could scarcel