The common-councilman jumped up and placed a chair for the great man, delighted at the prospect of doing _him_ a favour. "I wrote home a few days ago for them to send me a letter of credit on the bankers here. It came this morning, and just see what they have done!" Mr. Hardcastle tossed, as he spoke, the letter of credit to Mr. Dundyke. Now the latter, shrewd man of business though he was amid his own chests of tea, knew very little of these foreign letters of credit, their forms, or their appearance. All he could make out of the present one was, that it was a sort of order to receive one hundred pounds. "Don't you see the error?" exclaimed Mr. Hardcastle. "They have made it payable to my uncle, Stephen Hardcastle, instead of to me. _My_ name's not Stephen, so it would be perfectly useless for me to present it. How the clerks came to make so foolish a mistake I cannot tell. Some one of them I suppose, in the pressure of business, managed to give unintelligible orders to the bankers, and so caused the error." "Dear me!" said Mr. Dundyke. "Now I want to know if you can let me have this sum. I shall write immediately to get the thing rectified, and if you can accommodate me for a few days, until the needful comes, I will then repay you with many thanks." "But, dear me, sir!" exclaimed Mr. Dundyke,--"not but what I should be proud to do anything for you that I could, in my poor way--you don't suppose I've got a hundred pound here? Nor the half! nor the quarter of it!" Mr. Hardcastle carelessly smiled, and played with his glittering cable watch-chain. "I should not like to offer you what I _have_ got, sir," continued the common-councilman, "but I am sure if you took it as no offence, and it would be of any temporary use to you----" "Oh, thank you! No, it's not that," interrupted the great merchant. "Less than the hundred pounds would not be worth the trouble of borrowing. You have nothing like that sum, you say?" Out came Mr. Dundyke's purse and pocket-book. He counted over his store, and found that, English and French money combined, he possessed twenty-two pounds, eleven shillings. The twenty pounds, notes and gold, he pushed towards Mr. Hardcastle, the odd money he returned to his pocket. "You are quite welcome, sir, for a few days, if you will condescend to make use of it." "I feel extremely obliged to you," said Mr. Hardcastle; "I am half inclined to avail myself of your politeness. The fact is, Dundyke," he continued, confidentially, "my wife has been spending money wholesale, this last week--falling in love with a lot of useless jewellery, when she has got a cartload of it at home. I let her have what money she wanted, counting on my speedy remittances, and, upon my word, I am nearly drained. I will write you an acknowledgment."