Although he has never boasted of the fact, or assured his intimates that “he began life with the traditional sixpence,” Mr. Pollitt is a self-made man. He talks freely enough of his wife’s relations, of his nephew’s famous pedigree, but he has not once alluded in the most distant fashion to his own little family tree. Yet he has nothing to be ashamed of. His father was a gentleman by birth, a poor curate, who had left two almost penniless orphans, Dan and a sister, several years younger than himself. The former, while yet in his early teens, had clambered on to a stool in an office in the city, from thence (unusual flight) he had soared to success and wealth. Thanks to indomitable industry, shrewdness, and pluck, he was now a merchant of credit and renown. The latter, who was a remarkably pretty and well-educated girl, accompanied a lady to India, in the capacity of governess, and, in a startlingly short time, married Captain Jervis of the Bengal Cavalry, a good-looking popular officer, with a long pedigree and a somewhat slender purse. By all accounts, the marriage was a happy one. At the end of six years Mrs. Jervis died, and their only child, a boy of five, was sent to school in England. Five years later, he was followed by his father, who rushed home on three months’ leave, in order to see little Mark as well as his tailor and his dentist. Major Jervis, a bronzed, handsome, distinguished soldier, made an excellent impression on the plodding city man--his brother-in-law, who cordially invited him to stay with him at Norwood, where he had a luxurious bachelor establishment. And here, over unimpeachable claret and cigars, the Indian officer unfolded his plans. Little Mark was about to have a stepmother, the lady was a Miss Cardozo, of Portuguese extraction, dark, handsome, not very young, but enormously wealthy, and quite infatuated about little Mark’s papa. Her grandfather had been a military adventurer, whose sword and swagger had gained him the heart and treasures of a Begum. Miss Cardozo’s father was an indigo planter, in those good old times when indigo crops brought in lacs of rupees, and she was his sole heiress and an orphan. Besides the Begum’s wealth and jewels, she owned property in the Doon, property in the hills, property in Tirhoot, shares in banks and railways, and large investments in the funds. Mr. Pollitt’s shrewd little eyes glistened approvingly as he absorbed these particulars. “Cut the service, bring her to England, and take a fine country place,” was his prompt suggestion.