"To be sure. The West is for physical and financial energies. I think if a young man is to rely on his mental qualities he had better remain East. I am glad you have called upon me. The duties I wish attended to are very simple. You will have to read my mail every morning and answer it as I verbally direct. With the help of printed plates you will arrange my coins and seals and such matters. I wish you also to read the newspapers to me. In a day or two you will find out which articles to read and which to omit. I want a companion for my drives. I want some one to chat with me on my various hobbies--a young man, because young men have such positive opinions, and therefore we shall be likely to come to pleasant disputing. You will have a handsome room, a seat at my table, a place among my guests, and one hundred dollars a month." "I am very grateful to you, sir." "And I am very grateful to the kind fate which sent you to me. I owe your father for many a delightful day. I am glad to pay my debt to his son. When can you come here?" "This afternoon, sir." "I like that. We dine at seven. I will expect you to dinner. Do you--ahem!--excuse me, Mr. Tresham, perhaps you may require a little money in advance. I shall be pleased to accommodate you." "You offer is gracious and considerate, sir. I am glad you made it, although I do not fortunately need to accept it." They clasped hands and parted with smiles. Mr. Lanhearne was quite excited over the adventure. He longed for his daughter to come home, that he might tell her what a romantic answer had come to his prosaic advertisement. And Roland was still more excited. The air of the house, its peace, refinement, and luxury appealed irresistibly to him. It was his native air. He wondered how he had endured the vulgarity and penury of his surroundings for so long; how indeed he had borne with Denasia's shortcomings at all. That refined old gentleman, that quiet, elegant woman whom he had had a glimpse of--these people were like himself, of his own order--he would never weary of them. The class he had voluntarily chosen, the people with whom poverty had compelled him to consort, they affected him now as the memory of a debauch affects a man when it is over. "I had no business out of my proper sphere," he said sadly. "Elizabeth was right--right even about Denasia."