es of
sham malachite.

Mr. Sheldon's library was not a very inspiring apartment. His ideas of
a _sanctum sanctorum_ did not soar above the commonplace. A decent
square room, furnished with plenty of pigeon-holes, a neat brass scale
for the weighing of letters, a copying-press, a waste-paper basket, a
stout brass-mounted office inkstand capable of holding a quart or so of
ink, and a Post-office Directory, were all he asked for his hours of
leisure and meditation. In a handsome glazed bookcase, opposite his
writing-table, appeared a richly-bound edition of the _Waverley_
_Novels_, Knight's _Shakespeare_, Hume and Smollett, Fielding,
Goldsmith, and Gibbon; but, except when Georgy dusted the sacred
volumes with her own fair hands, the glass doors of the bookcase were
never opened.

Mr. Sheldon turned on the gas, seated himself at his comfortable
writing-table, and took up his pen. A quire of office note-paper, with
his City address upon it, lay ready beneath his hand; but he did not
begin to write immediately. He sat for some time with his elbows on the
table, and his chin in his hands, meditating with dark fixed brows.

"Can I trust her?" he asked himself. "Is it safe to have her near
me--after--after what she said to me in Fitzgeorge-street? Yes, I think
I can trust her, up to a certain point; but beyond that I must be on my
guard. She might be more dangerous than a stranger. One thing is quite
clear--she must be provided for somehow or other. The question is,
whether she is to be provided for in this house or out of it; and
whether I can make her serve me as I want to be served?"

This was the gist of Mr. Sheldon's meditations; but they lasted for
some time. The question which he had to settle was an important one,
and he was too wise a man not to contemplate a subject from every
possible point of sight before arriving at his decision. He took a
letter-clip from one side of his table, and turned over several open
letters in search of some particular document.

He came at last to the letter he wanted. It was written on very common
note-paper, with brown-looking ink, and the penmanship was evidently
that of an uneducated person; but Mr. Sheldon studied its contents with
the air of a man who is dealing with no unimportant missive.

This was the letter which so deeply interested the stockbroker:--

"HONORED SIR--This coms hopping that You and Your Honored ladie are
well has it leevs me tho nott so strong has i coud