ades and handles together with his
own hands, at odd times, though he had long ceased to forge or grind.

Mr. Raby drew in haughtily at this interference.

It soon transpired that Mr. James Little had died hopelessly insolvent,
and the L1900 would really have been ingulfed.

Raby waited for this fact to sink into his sister's mind; and then one
day nature tugged so at his heart-strings, that he dashed off a warm
letter beginning--"My poor Edith, let bygones be bygones," and inviting
her and her boy to live with him at Raby Hall.

The heart-broken widow sent back a reply, in a handwriting scarcely
recognizable as hers. Instead of her usual precise and delicate hand,
the letters were large, tremulous, and straggling, and the lines slanted
downward.

"Write to me, speak to me, no more. For pity's sake let me forget there
is a man in the world who is my brother and his murderer.

"EDITH."

Guy opened this letter with a hopeful face, and turned pale as ashes at
the contents.

But his conscience was clear, and his spirit high. "Unjust idiot!" he
muttered, and locked her letter up in his desk.

Next morning he received a letter from Joseph Little, in a clear, stiff,
perpendicular writing:

"SIR,--I find my sister-in-law wrote you, yesterday, a harsh letter,
which I do not approve; and have told her as much. Deceased's affairs
were irretrievable, and I blame no other man for his rash act, which may
God forgive! As to your kind and generous invitation, it deserves her
gratitude; but Mrs. Little and myself have mingled our tears together
over my poor brother's grave, and now we do not care to part. Before
your esteemed favor came to hand, it had been settled she should leave
this sad neighborhood and keep my house at Birmingham, where she will
meet with due respect. I am only a small tradesman; but I can pay my
debts, and keep the pot boiling. Will teach the boy some good trade, and
make him a useful member of society, if I am spared.

"I am, sir, yours respectfully,

"JOSEPH LITTLE."

"Sir,--I beg to acknowledge, with thanks, your respectable letter.

"As all direct communication between Mrs. James Little and myself is at
an end, oblige me with your address in Birmingham, that I may remit to
you, half-yearly, as her agent, the small sum that has escaped bricks
and mortar.

"When her son comes of age, she will probably forgive me for declining
to defraud him of his patrimony.

"But it will be too late