Mr. Dillworthy gave him a kind look and said: "It is not an opportune time to seek your aid in a cause in which you are not personally interested, when another subject, the welfare of a dear daughter, must naturally engross your attention. Pray forgive me, Mr. Cohen." Aaron bent his head, and as the lawyer closed the door behind him sank into his chair with a heavy sigh. CHAPTER XXXII. BEFORE ALL, DUTY. On this evening many pressing matters claimed his attention, and before Mr. Dillworthy's visit he had intended to devote himself entirely to them. He took an active part in the dispensing of several Jewish charities, and his personal attendance was necessary to a wise distribution of their funds. Some of these charities were modest in the limited extent of their aims, but they needed care and attention, and his presence was always anxiously looked for by both the administrators and recipients. Meetings of two of the charities were to be held this evening, and he had promised to preside at both. He must not disappoint them. Before all, duty. That was the thought that came to him--before all, duty, and it was only the iteration of it that brought a true sense of its significance to his mind. Before all, duty, in these public matters--but did it not also apply to private life? And if so, what part in the strict adherence to the axiom did love occupy? What was his duty here at home in respect of his wife and the girl he had brought up as their daughter? He endeavored to thrust the reflection aside, and drew forth some papers which bore reference to the charities and to another matter of great public, importance which had occupied him for weeks past, and which he was on the point of bringing to a successful conclusion. He strove now to concentrate his attention upon the papers, for he was to attend a late night meeting at eleven o'clock at which a decision was to be arrived at which was to affect thousands of poor families. There had been a great strike in the building trade, and vast numbers of men had voluntarily thrown themselves out of employment, and had chosen what was almost next door to starvation in their adherence to a principle. The strike had been brought about chiefly by Aaron's great rival contractor, a Mr. Poynter, an employer of labor on a gigantic scale, and a man as well known as Aaron himself. To say that these two were rivals does not necessarily imply that they were enemies, for that is a game that two must play at, and it was a game in which Aaron played no part. He did not approve of Mr. Poynter's methods--he went no farther than that. On the other hand, Mr. Poynter hated Aaron with a very sincere and conscientious hate. He hated him because he had lost several profitable contracts which Aaron had obtained, and this hatred may be applied in a general sense because he hated every successful rival, great or small.