"I wish her well," replied John, and then he halted in what he intended to say further--halted for a moment only, when he asked: "Mr. Jarney, with your permission, I should like to see Miss Jarney, once in awhile during her illness. May I have the wish granted?" "I have no objection--while she is ill," he answered, with that singular proviso attached. Then he sat down, and took up his work. At noon he asked John to lunch with him. John accepted, and lunched. At four p. m. he asked John to accompany him home for dinner. John accepted, and went. The combination of circumstances surrounding John's intimacies with the Jarney family was very indefinable to him, at first. But, as the days passed, he was slowly and assuredly convinced that his services as employe of that man of wealth were not of the sordid kind alone. Mr. Jarney's condescending manner, his straight-forwardness, his implicit faith in him, his good will toward him, his extinguishment of form, all showed to him that he was not so unapproachable as might be believed by any young man of the qualities of John Winthrope. Possessed with an unquenchable desire to do that which is right, honest, honorable, or justifiable, John pursued a course that ever kept him in good favor. He did not do this with any preconceived plan, or scheme, to accomplish a purpose, but it was through an inherent prepossession of his makeup. Through the days he labored with great assiduity to get results; through the evenings he studied with great concentration on his subjects--always busy, always ready to answer a call, or a summons. All these traits in him, Mr. Jarney was not slow in perceiving, and he gave encouragement, as he would, like any other man of his mould, to any one who showed the same relative adaptation and faithfulness. Mr. Jarney looked upon John as having many parts worth cultivating. As he had, for a long time, been gleaning in the field of young manhood for such a reaping, he now considered, since he acquired John, that he had harvested a good sheaf of wheat when he garnered him; and he purposed, if all continued straight in him, to flail out his true worth, if the throwing out of opportunity would be effectually grasped. But while he had these views concerning such material for his purpose, he, at no time, thought that his daughter would, in any manner, enter into the proposition. He would not have thought of compromising his views on business with his paternal ideas; nor would he ever have condoned himself, or his wife, should either have entertained an iota of a notion that it were necessary to bring her name into such mercenary transactions.