And when he had left her, she said to herself, "Ay, mouths enough, and very little to put into them! A tolerably good clerk is all you are, my boy, and now you have not even an unblemished character. I should have to work all the same, and maybe for them as well as for myself. No, thank you, Mr. Fred; it is not playing the flute that will help you now, and if my lord will get me a snug place, as he offered to do when poor mother died, I don't want to have you on my hands. I think I was a fool not to take the offer then. What great good has my marriage done me? By the way, Janet has a brother somewhere, doing well, if I remember right. But no, Fred is not likely to do well after all this; I'll keep to my resolution." Fred, of course, had to tell Janet that there was no hope of help from grandma. "And I think you are right, dear, and that I had better get away at once. I will take just what will pay travelling expenses, and keep me for a few days. I will write and tell you where to join me. You must settle everything here, and come as soon as I send for you. I could not stand the—the disgrace, Janet. Every one will know to-morrow that I am dismissed, and Henley won't be silent." Poor, selfish Fred! He desired nothing so much as to get away before his disgrace was known, and poor Janet, in her unselfish love, was as anxious about it as he could be. Fred had always held his head high, and whatever private discontent he felt with his situation, he had always been considered a very fortunate young man, much better off than others of his years. To meet those who had always admired and looked up to him, in his new character, as a dismissed man and a defaulting speculator, he felt would drive him mad. So, having kissed his two boys as they slept sweetly in their little beds, he bade farewell to Janet, telling her to come to Liverpool, to the Ship Hotel, Guelph Street, where he would write to her; he could not say where he would be, as that would depend upon the boats he might be in time for. And then he was gone; and poor Janet crept off to bed, cold and stunned, and almost heartbroken. [Illustration] [Illustration] CHAPTER III. IN LIVERPOOL. NEXT day, Janet sent for a broker, and pointed out to him such articles of furniture as Fred had told her belonged to him. She was in the midst of making her bargain when, to her surprise, in came Mrs. Rayburn, who had not left her room for many days. "Betty told me, my dear, that Mr. Pitman was here; so I guessed it was about your piano, and I crept in, for I may as well dispose of my few things at the same time." And, turning to Mr. Pitman, she proceeded to point out what she claimed. It was not very much, but it was nearly all that Janet had been speaking about, and the poor girl reddened when she found Pitman looking doubtfully at her. She said— "I did not know, grandma, that these things were yours. We thought they were ours."