rove the match and am ready to dower the bride," said
Victor.

"But I have not ventured to speak to her yet," stammered Mr. Lyle.

"Then you may do so just as soon as you please," answered Victor.

"And now about Alden," said Mr. Lyle, by way of changing the
conversation.

"Yes, now about Alden. He does not suspect that I am his banker, I
hope?"

"No, indeed! I paid him over the munificent sum you intrusted to me for
him. He feels--well, I may say painfully grateful, and is confident that
he must some time repay you, with interest and compound interest."

"Yes, my boy will certainly repay me, but not in the way he thinks,"
observed Victor, gravely.

"After a week's visiting with his sister at Blue Cliffs, he will go up
to Richmond and select a site for his office and purchase his law
library, though I think he will have to go to Philadelphia to do that."

"Yes, I suppose he will," admitted Hartman.

"What are your own plans about yourself, Victor, if I may be allowed to
ask?" inquired the minister.

"Well, I haven't any. I came on here to see my boy and girl, and settle
them in life as well as I can. I shall stay till I do that anyway. After
that I don't know what I shall do. I do not care about going back to
California. My business there is in the hands of a capable and
trustworthy agent. And somehow I like the old mother State; and now
that you lead me to think about it, perhaps I shall spend the rest of my
life here; but, as I said before, I don't know."

"By the way, dear Victor, you spoke to me with much simple frankness of
my most private personal affairs. May I take the same liberty with you?"
inquired Mr. Lyle, very seriously.

"Why, of course you may, if you call it a liberty, which I don't, you
know!" answered Victor, with a smile.

"Then, my dear Hartman, how about Miss Electra? I was not so absorbed in
my own interests as not to have an eye to yours."

"Ah, Miss Electra! Well, parson, she _was_ my little old acquaintance of
Rat Alley, when I flourished in that fragrant neighborhood as Galley
Vick."

"No!" exclaimed Mr. Lyle, opening his eyes wide with astonishment.

"Yes," quietly answered Victor Hartman. "And it is a wonder that you,
who know the family so well, do not know this episode in its history."

"How was I to know, my friend, when no one ever told me? I suppose that
few or none but the family know anything about it."

"I suppose you are right," said Victor. "Well, you see, she