"It may not be so," his grandmother said, laying her hand upon his head. "I cannot quite think Jessie would prefer him to you, and she has known you always, too. Suppose you talk with her upon the subject. It will not make the matter worse." "Grandmother," said Walter, "I have promised never to speak of love to Jessie Graham until I am freed from the taint my father’s misfortune has fastened upon my name, and as there is no hope that this will ever be, I must live on and see her given to another. Were my rival anybody but William, I could bear it better, for I want Jessie to be happy, and I believe him to be—a villain, and I would far rather that Jessie would die than be his bride." Walter was very much excited, and as the atmosphere of the room seemed oppressive, he seized his hat and rushed out into the street, meeting by the way William and Jessie. They were walking very slowly, and apparently so absorbed with themselves, that neither observed him till just as he was passing, when Jessie looked up and called after him: "Are you never coming to see me again?" "I don’t know,—perhaps not," was the cool answer, and Walter hastened on, while William, who never let an opportunity pass for a sly insinuation against his cousin, asked Jessie if she had not observed how consequential Walter had grown since his grandmother took him up and pushed him into society. "Everybody is laughing about it," said he, "but that is the way with people of his class. They cannot bear prosperity." "I think Walter has too much good sense," Jessie replied, "to be lifted up by the attentions of those who used to slight him, but who notice him now just because Mrs. Bellenger likes him. There’s Mrs. Reeves, for instance,—it’s perfectly sickening to hear her talk about ’dear Mr. Marshall,’ when she used to speak of him as ’that poor young man in Mr. Graham’s employ.’ Charlotte always liked him." This last was not very agreeable to Will, for in case he failed to secure Jessie, Charlotte was his next choice. Money he must have, and soon too, for there was a heavy burden on his mind, and unless that burden was lifted disgrace was sure to follow. Twice recently he had written to his father for money and received the same answer: "I have nothing for you; go to your grandmother, who has plenty." Once he had asked Mrs. Bellenger for a hundred dollars; but she had said that "a young man in perfect health ought to have some occupation, and as he had none he had no right to live as expensively as he did."