"The landlady told me to come up," he said, as he glanced around the wretched apartment, and a slight twinge of remorse touched his heart as he remarked the changed appearance of Edith. She motioned him to enter, while Mrs. Euston arose from the bed, and offered him a seat. "I concluded it would be best to reply to your communication in person," said he to Mrs. Euston, as he took the offered chair. "I come with the most liberal intentions, provided Miss Euston will listen to reason. I am grieved to see you in a place so unsuited to your former station as this wretched apartment." "And yet," said Edith, "I have passed some pleasant hours in this room, comfortless as it looks. So long as I had the hope of being able to provide for our wants by my own exertions, I found contentment in its humble shelter." "Your happiness must then be truly independent of outward circumstances," replied Barclay, with a touch of his old sarcasm. "I supposed, from the tenor of your mother's petition, that you had begun to repent of your high-toned language to me in our last interview, and would now accede to terms you once spurned, as the price of my assistance to you and yours." Edith curbed her high spirit, and calmly replied, "You misunderstood my mother's words. As the mother of the late heir, she justly considers herself entitled to a pittance from your estate, and she claimed from your humanity, what she was hopeless of obtaining from your sense of justice. For myself, I hoped for nothing from either, but I acquiesced in her application. I am sorry that you have founded on it expectations which must prove fallacious." "Then, madam, I need remain no longer," said Barclay, addressing Mrs. Euston. "Your daughter remembers our interview previous to, and after, the death of her brother; the only terms on which I would assist you were then explicitly expressed." Mrs. Euston caught his hand, and bowed her venerable head upon it. "Have mercy, Robert, upon my gray hairs--my daughter; look at her--she is dying by inches--she is stifling in this wretched spot. The money that was my son's should surely buy a shelter for us. Leave us not helpless, hopeless. My God! my God! give me eloquence to plead for my child!" and she threw herself upon the floor, and raised her clasped hands to heaven. "Madam," said Barclay, "it only rests with your daughter to have mercy upon you and herself. Where, I ask you, is her filial piety, when she beholds you suffer thus, and relents not toward one who offers her a love that has survived coldness, contempt, contumely." Edith approached her mother, and assisted her to rise. "My dearest mother, calm yourself. Humble not yourself thus before our oppressor. God is just--is merciful. He will not forget the widow and the orphan in their extremity. Leave us, Mr. Barclay; had my wishes alone been consulted, you never would have been called on thus to witness our misfortunes." Barclay bowed, and haughtily strode from the room.