Ralph Herkimer sat in his New York hotel looking glum. The turn he had been expecting in Pikes Peak and Montana had come; the stock had been brought into notice at last, but it would have been better for him if it had remained unquoted on the share list, as it had been for weeks back. The turn was one for the worse. The shares had gone begging on Wall Street. Nobody would buy. He sat with his hands in his pockets, his chair tilted back, and his hat drawn over his eyes, pulling furiously at a huge cigar, and involving himself in smoke. It was a serious position of his affairs, and there was nothing he could do in the circumstances but wait--wait till he was ruined outright, which at the moment seemed likely enough, or be patient through months, if not years, till improvement came. Of the two alternatives, the former seemed at that moment the preferable, in so far as that it would be soonest over. The Canada mail was in; his letters were brought him--an unpleasant bundle always now. "They can wait. There is no hurry." He pushes them aside. But, stay! There is one from his wife. "Martha," he says, and breaks the seal. He was intensely sorry for himself that afternoon. The world was so hard. Nobody seemed a bit interested to know that he was on the verge of being ruined; in fact, it inclined them rather to get out of his way. "Ill-luck," one would have said, to see them, "must be infectious." His friends on Wall Street seemed busy that day whenever he wanted to discuss with them, and some had even been rather short, as to a manifest bore. If he would, he might have recollected that such are the manners and customs among money-makers, when a money-loser comes along. He had practised them himself; but that was when other people were the losers; now it was he, and that made all the difference. But Martha was fond of him, and he turned to her letter for comfort and sympathy in his deep self-pity. He was fond of Martha, as fond, at least, as a busy man with his head full of other things can afford to be of anybody; but that Martha was fond of _him_ in he never doubted, and that was the aspect of their connection, which was comfortable to dwell on at that moment. He lit a fresh cigar, and opened his letter. It was a long letter, and began by answering all the questions which he had asked, and then it went on: "Gerald and Muriel talk about their marriage continually, as is to be expected, poor children. I have been trying to stave it off till you shall have arranged your affairs, and are able to play the part you would wish on the occasion; but I am only Gerald's mother, and it is Muriel who has the right to say when. Besides, Gerald will not allow me to put in a word which would sound like wishing delay, and Muriel seems to think that if Gerald is there, it does not matter much about his father. I cannot altogether blame the girl; it would have been my own thought twenty-five years ago, and, to be sure, I like to see my boy valued as he deserves.