"Yes. Now what I want to propose to you is this--I think you love me, professor?" "Love you, young--Mr. Worth! Why the Lord in heaven bless your dear heart, I love you better than I do anything on the face of the earth, and that's a fact," said the professor, with his face all in a glow of feeling. And all who knew him might have known that he spoke truth; for though he was not in the least degree deficient in affection for his daughters, yet his love of Ishmael amounted almost to idolatry. "Dear old friend, I will prove to you some day how high a value I set upon your love. I think, professor, that loving me, as you do, you could live happily with me?" "What did you say, young--Mr. Worth? I did not quite understand." "I will be plain, professor. You have lived out your present life here; it is gone. Now, instead of vegetating on here any longer, come into another sphere, a more enlarged and active sphere, where your thoughts as well as your hands will find employment and your mind as well as your body have food." "How is that to be done, young--Mr. Worth?" "Come with me to Washington. I have a suite of three very pleasant rooms in the house where I board. Now suppose you come and live with me and take care of my rooms? Your services would be worth a good, liberal salary, from which you would be enabled to live very comfortably and save money." "What, young Ishmael! Me! I go to Washington and live with you all the time, day and night, under one roof! and live where I can get books and newspapers and hear lectures and debates and see pictures and models, and, in short, come at everything I have been longing to reach all my life?" "Yes, professor, that is what I propose to you." "There! I used to say that you'd live to be a blessing to my declining years, young--Mr. Worth (I declare I'll not forget myself again), Mr. Worth! there! Do you really mean it, sir?" "Really and truly." "There, then, I am not going to be a hypocrite and pretend to higgle-haggle about it. I'll go, sir; and be proud to do it; it will be taking a new lease of life for me to go. Do you know, I never was in a large city in all my life, though I have always longed to go? Well, sir, I'll go with you. And I will serve you faithfully, sir; for mine will be a service for love more than for money. And I will never forget the proprieties so far as to call you anything else but 'Mr. Worth,' or 'sir,' in the presence of others, sir, though my heart does betray me into calling you young Ishmael sometimes here." "I shall leave here on Saturday morning. Can you be ready to go with me as soon as that?" "Of course I can, Mr. Worth. There's nothing for me to do in the way of preparation but to pack my knapsack and lock my door," answered this "Rough and Ready." "Very well, then, professor, I like your promptitude. Meet me at Brudenell Hall on Saturday morning at seven o'clock, and in the meantime I will find a conveyance for you."