Mr. Hillary had resumed his seat, and was staring absently at the desk before him, where all things looked so neat and orderly that Maude seemed justified in thinking that her father’s work was done. There was a row of drawers on each side of the desk. One of them was open, and a bunch of keys hung from the lock. A copy of the _Times_ newspaper lay across the top of this open drawer; but as Miss Hillary hung about her father, some portion of the silken flounces or furbelows of her dress brushed against the paper, and it fell rustling to the ground. Lionel Hillary turned suddenly with a look of alarm directed towards the open drawer, and Maude, following his glance, saw something lying among the neat packets of letters and papers,--something which had no business to be there; something which seemed to realize a greater terror than any that her fancy had shaped, however dimly, during those hours of weary waiting in the room above. The object which seemed so terrible to Maude Hillary was a pistol--a small pistol, of very modern fashion, fresh and bright from the hands of the gunmaker. Mr. Hillary was not a man who affected the gunsmith’s art, and Maude had never seen such a weapon in her father’s possession until to-night;--until _this_ night, when vague fears respecting him had been so long busy in her brain, only wanting a form into which to shape themselves. It seemed as if her frivolous girlhood left her all at once. It seemed as if that great terror, coming upon her with such ghastly suddenness, transformed her into a woman--a woman possessed of woman’s highest attributes, fortitude, and self-abnegation. She uttered no cry of alarm, no exclamation of surprise; but she suddenly closed and locked the drawer in which the pistol lay, and dropped the bunch of keys into her pocket. Then kneeling down beside her father’s chair, she put her arms tenderly about him, and laid her head upon his breast. Mr. Hillary had grown very passive all at once, and sat idly staring at the table before him. “Papa,” Maude said presently, in a low, pleading voice, “what is it? tell me, confide in me. In whom should you trust, if not in me? What is it, papa? what does it mean?” “It means--ruin!” the merchant answered, huskily. He did not turn towards his daughter, but still sat staring blankly straight before him. “It means failure and ruin, Maude; ruin in its worst shape, its most hideous shape.”