s very unsatisfactory. Not one word is
let drop about the lost money.

Brother Phills will say this--that the romance is very cleverly got up,
as the theatre people say.

The good-natured fat man, breathing somewhat freer, says: "Truly! these
people have a pleasant way of passing out of the world. They die of
their artful practices--seeking to devour the good and the generous."

"There's more suffers than imposes--an' there's more than's written
meant in that same bit of paper. Toddleworth was as inoffensive a
creature as you'd meet in a day. May God forgive him all his faults;"
interposes Mr. Detective Fitzgerald, gathering up his cap and passing
slowly out of the room.

And this colloquy is put an end to by the sudden appearance of Sister
Slocum. A rustling silk dress, of quiet color, and set off with three
modest flounces; an India shawl, loosely thrown over her shoulders; a
dainty little collar, of honiton, drawn neatly about her neck, and a
bonnet of buff-colored silk, tastefully set off with tart-pie work
without, and lined with virtuous white satin within, so saucily poised
on her head, suggests the idea that she has an eye to fashion as well as
the heathen world. Her face, too, always so broad, bright, and
benevolent in its changes--is chastely framed in a crape border, so
nicely crimped, so nicely tucked under her benevolent chin at one end,
and so nicely pinned under the virtuous white lining at the other.
Goodness itself radiates from those large; earnest blue eyes, those
soft, white cheeks, that large forehead, with those dashes of silvery
hair crossing it so smoothly and so exactly--that well-developed, but
rather broad nose, and that mouth so expressive of gentleness.

Sister Slocum, it requires no very acute observer to discover, has got
something more than the heathen world at heart, for all those soft,
congenial features are shadowed with sadness. Silently she takes her
seat, sits abstracted for a few minutes--the house is thrown into a
wondering mood--then looks wisely through her spectacles, and having
folded her hands with an air of great resignation, shakes, and shakes,
and shakes her head. Her eyes suddenly fill with tears, her thoughts
wander, or seem to wander, she attempts to speak, her voice chokes, and
the words hang upon her lips. All is consternation and excitement.
Anxious faces gather round, and whispering voices inquire the cause. The
lean man in the spectacles having applied his har