of running upstairs to find out, the visitor
called me back.

'Half a second,' he said. 'Are you young Everard?'

'Yes,' I replied; and fixing an eyeglass in his left eye, he looked at
me with considerable curiosity.

'Tell your aunt,' he continued, 'that Captain Knowlton wishes to see
her.'

And upon that I ran off, shouting, 'Aunt Marion! Aunt Marion!' at the
top of my voice. 'Aunt Marion,' I repeated, entering the sitting-room,
'Captain Knowlton is downstairs, and he wants to speak to you.'

'Captain Knowlton!' she murmured.

'Shall I bring him up?' I asked.

Rising from the sofa, and laying down the newspaper which she had been
reading, Aunt Marion walked towards the door. She must have been near
her thirty-fifth year at that time, about the same age as our visitor.
She was tall, fair, and nice-looking, good-tempered, and perhaps a
little careless. That morning she was wearing a light blue
dressing-gown, although it was past eleven o'clock.

'Yes, bring Captain Knowlton up,' she answered, 'and ask him to wait a
few minutes.'

As she went to the bedroom, I returned to the street door, where Captain
Knowlton stood gazing at Jane as she continued to smack the oilcloth
with her wet flannel.

'You are to come upstairs,' I cried, and following me to the
sitting-room, he sat down and began to stare afresh.

'So you are poor Frank Everard's boy!' he said.

'Did you know my father?' I demanded, for I had no recollection of
either parent, or of any relative with the exception of Aunt Marion,
under whose charge I had moved about from lodging-house to lodging-house
since I was four years of age.

'Well,' said Captain Knowlton, 'if I had not known him, I should not be
here to-day.'

He became silent for a few moments, and then added, as he took my hand
and drew me against his knee, 'Your father once saved my life, Jack. How
old are you?' he asked.

'Eleven next month,' I replied, and, somewhat to my disappointment, Aunt
Marion entered the room as I spoke, wearing the dress in which she went
to church on Sundays.

'I have often heard of you, Captain Knowlton,' she said, as he rose from
his chair, 'although I have never seen you before.'

'Oh, well,' he answered, 'I have been in India the last five years! I
came home last week, and from a few words I heard at the club, I
gathered that poor Frank Everard's boy----'

Aunt Marion's cheeks flushed, and she held her head a little further
back.

'I have done t