ide for a trifling matter like
this. But now, as the image of that sad face--for it was unusually
sad at the moment when Mr. Everett looked suddenly toward the
boy--lingered in his mind, growing every moment more distinct, and
more touchingly beautiful, many considerations of duty and humanity
were excited. He remembered his old friend, and the pleasant hours
they had spent together in years long since passed, ere generous
feelings had hardened into ice, or given place to all-pervading
selfishness. He remembered, too, the beautiful girl his friend had
married, and how proudly that friend presented her to their little
world as his bride. The lad had her large, dark, spiritual
eyes--only the light of joy had faded therefrom, giving place to a
strange sadness.

All this was now present to the mind of Mr. Everett, and though he
tried once or twice during the boy's absence to obliterate these
recollections, he was unable to do so.

"How is your mother, John?" kindly asked the broker, when the lad
returned from his errand.

The question was so unexpected, that it confused him.

"She's well--thank you, sir. No--not very well, either--thank you,
sir."

And the boy's face flushed, and his eyes suffused.

"Not very well, you say?" Mr. Everett spoke with kindness, and in a
tone of interest. "Not sick, I hope?"

"No, sir; not very sick. But"----

"But what, John," said Mr., Everett, encouragingly.

"She's in trouble," half stammered the boy, while the colour
deepened on his face.

"Ah, indeed? I'm sorry for that. What is the trouble, John?"

The tears which John had been vainly striving to repress now gushed
over his face, and, with a boyish shame for the weakness, he turned
away and struggled for a time with his overmastering feelings. Mr.
Everett was no little moved by so unexpected an exhibition. He
waited with a new-born consideration for the boy, not unmingled with
respect, until a measure of calmness was restored.

"John," he then said, "if your mother is in trouble, it may be in my
power to relieve her."

"O sir!" exclaimed the lad eagerly, coming up to Mr. Everett, and,
in the forgetfulness of the moment, laying his small hand upon that
of his employer, "if you will, you can."

Hard indeed would have been the heart that could have withstood the
appealing, eyes lifted by John Levering to the face of Mr. Everett.
But Mr. Everett had not a hard heart. Love of self and the world had
encrusted it with indiffe