.

"Guess he's goin' to start another cheat," said the milkman, who had
stopped at the saloon opposite Rosenstein's. "I seed him git on the
eight-ten train."

Charlotte had been told by her father that he was going to New York
that morning, and she had risen early and prepared what she
considered a wonderful breakfast for him. She was radiant. Anderson
had called upon her the evening before. She had never been so happy.
Her father seemed in very good spirits, but she wondered why he
looked so badly. It was actually as if he had lost ten pounds since
the night before. He was horribly haggard, but he talked and laughed
in a manner rather unusual for him, as he ate his breakfast.
Charlotte watched jealously that he should do that. When he took his
second badly fried egg, she beamed, and he concealed his physical and
mental nausea.

When they were eating breakfast, much to Charlotte's amazement, the
village express drove into the yard.

"Why, there is the express, papa!" she said.

"Yes, honey," replied Carroll, calmly. "I have a trunk I want to send
to New York."

"Oh, papa, you are not going away?"

"Sending a trunk does not necessarily imply you are going yourself,
honey. I have a trunk to send in connection with some business."

"Oh!" said Charlotte, quite satisfied.

Carroll rose from the table and showed the expressman the way to his
room, and the trunk was brought down and carried away, and Charlotte
asked no more questions and thought no more about it. Carroll walked
to the station. When it was time for him to start, he went to
Charlotte, who was clearing away the breakfast dishes, and held her
in his arms and kissed her.

"Good-bye, papa's blessing," he said, and in spite of himself his
voice broke. The man had reached the limit of his strength.

But Charlotte, who was neither curious nor suspicious, and was,
besides, dazzled by her new happiness, only laughed. "Why, papa, I
should think you were going away to stay a year!" said she.

Carroll laughed too, but his laugh was piteous. He kissed her again.
"Well, good-bye, honey," he said. Just as he was going out of the
door he stopped, and said, as if it were a minor matter which he had
nearly forgotten, "Oh, by-the-way, sweetheart, I want you, at exactly
half-past nine, to go into the den and look in the third volume of
the Dutch Republic, and see what you will find."

Charlotte giggled. "A present!" said she. "I know it is a present,
but what a fu