"Yes; it will explain matters; you will learn from it what it would pain me to tell you in any other way." "Smoke a cigar while I read." Aaron took the cigar, and laid it aside, and then Mr. Moss, who had taken off his thick coat, sat down and perused the letter. "I have come in the nick of time, Cohen," he said. "There is a silver lining to every cloud; I have brought it with me." "I felt," said Aaron, his hopes rising, "that you could not be the bearer of bad news." "Not likely, friend Cohen. I am the bearer of good news, of the best of news. Don't be led away; it isn't a legacy--no, no, it isn't a legacy, but something almost as good, and I hope you will not throw away the chance." "If it is anything that will relieve me from my terrible embarrassments it is not likely that I shall throw it away." "It will do that for a certainty, and there is money attaching to it which I have in my pocket, and which I can pay over to you this very night." "How can I thank you? how can I thank you?" "Don't try to, and don't be surprised at what you hear. It is a strange piece of business, and I should have refused to undertake it if I had not said to myself, 'This will suit my friend Cohen; it will lift him out of his trouble.' But upon my word, now that I'm here I don't know how to commence. I never met with anything like it in all my life, and if you were well off you would be the last man in the world I should have dreamt of coming to. But you are not well off, Cohen; you have lost everything; Rachel is ill, and the doctor says she must be taken out of this cold and dismal climate to a place where she can see the sun, and where the air is mild and warm. I dare say you're thinking, 'Moss is speaking in a strange way,' and so I am; but it's nothing to what I've got to tell you. Cohen, what will happen if you can't afford to do as the doctor advises you?" "Do not ask me," groaned Aaron. "I dare not think of it--I dare not, I dare not!" "I don't say it unkindly, Cohen, but it seems to me to be a matter of life and death." Aaron clasped his forehead. "Very well, then; and don't forget that it is in your own hands. Before I commence I must say a word about myself. I can't do all you ask me in this letter; as I'm a living man I should be glad to assist you, but I have entered into a large speculation which has taken all my spare cash, and all I could afford would be eight or ten pounds. How long would that last you? In two or three weeks it would be gone, and you would be no better off than you were before; and as to taking Rachel to the South of France, that would be quite out of the question." "But you held out hope to me," said the trembling Aaron, "you said you were the bearer of good news!"