"Thank you," said Lewiston mechanically, and as mechanically holding out his hand for the cigar, evidently forgetting it the next moment. "The fact is, I don't want to seem importunate, but if you could pay off that note fifteen days before date,--a week from to-day, that is,--we'd discount it to satisfy you, if you can collect now. I didn't want to bother you about it, and I tried outside first, but nobody will take up the paper just now, except at a ruinous rate. If you could make it convenient, Alexander." Young Lewiston sat with his small, eager face bent forward over his knees, his lips twitching slightly. "You know, that money wasn't loaned on strictly business principles, Alexander, but for friendship; I got father to consent to it. And if you could let us have it now, it would save us a world of trouble. It's really not much--only ten thousand." Justin shook his head, his keen blue eyes fixed on the other. "I can't let you have it, Lewiston; I wish I could! But I'm waiting payments myself. Can't you pull out without it?" Lewiston drew in his breath. "Oh, yes, of course we'll have to; but it means-- Well, I know you would if you could, Alexander; I told father so--father in a way holds me responsible. He was in London when I renewed the note the last time. There isn't anything to interfere with the payment when it's due?" "On my honor, no," said Justin. "You shall have it then without fail." "For if that should slip up--" continued young Lewiston, wrapped in somber contemplation of his own affairs alone; he threw his arms outward with a gesture suddenly tragic in its intensity, paused an instant, then wrung Justin's hand silently and departed. "Are you busy, Alexander? They said I could come in." "Why, Girard!" Justin wheeled a chair around with an instantly brightened face. "Sit down. I'm mighty glad to see you." He looked smilingly at his visitor, whose presence, long-limbed, straight, clean, and clear-eyed, always elicited a peculiar admiration from other men. "I heard that you had a room at the Snows' now, while Billy is away, but I haven't laid eyes on you for a month." "I've been coming in on a later train every morning and going out again on a very much later one at night. I'm back in town on the paper for a while." "Why don't you settle down to something worth while?" asked Justin, with the reserved disapproval of the business man for any mode of life but his own. [Illustration: "MRS. SNOW WAS FUMBLING WITH A PAPER"]