“But for you,” he said, in unsteady tones, “I should have been a ruined man a week hence. To tell you that I am _ashamed_ to receive this gift from you does not express half what I feel, when I look back and remember your position in my family. But you have bestowed it so kindly and delicately that it would be churlish in me to refuse it; and you have taught me a lesson which, God helping me, I will never forget—a lesson of forgiveness and charity; and _no one_ in my house shall ever be treated unkindly again, no matter what their position may be,” he concluded, with stern resolution. “Please forget all the past, Mr. Richards,” Star returned, sweetly, but with evident embarrassment. “I never entertained any feeling save that of gratitude and good-will toward you, for you proved yourself interested in my welfare in more instances than one while I was with you. But,” she added, solemnly, while she clung tightly to his hands, and looked into his eyes with an expression which made them droop guiltily before her, “will you not promise me that, no matter how dark the future may be to you, no matter what trials or disappointments may come to you, you will never again meditate _doing yourself an irreparable wrong_?” A streak of dusky red shot across the man’s forehead, while his veins filled out hard and full. “Star,” he stammered, “what do you mean?—what do you know?” “_You_ know what I mean. I read it in your eyes, I heard it in the tones of your voice this morning. But, oh! my friend,” and her voice was full of tears, “remember that you are ‘bought with a price’—you are _not your own_. Promise me.” He raised her hands and kissed them reverently, and two hot tears rolled over his cheeks and dropped upon them in the act. “I promise,” he whispered, hoarsely. “My child, I should indeed have been ruined, body and soul, but for you. God bless you!” Star and Mr. Rosevelt followed him to the door as he went out, both trying to cheer him with kind wishes for the future. “Good-night and good-by,” the young girl said, in tones that sounded to him like an angel’s voice, as she stood in the door-way and watched him go down the steps. “Be sure to come and see us again when we return; the latch-string is always out, as they say at the West, for our friends.” A mighty sob burst from the overcharged heart of George Richards as he reached the street, and the tears—tears of mingled remorse, gratitude, and relief—rolled thick and fast over his face. “Thank God,” he murmured, fervently, “for the light of that ‘star’ in the midst of what was worse than Stygian darkness. But for its friendly beams and cheering influence, I should have been lost indeed.” He had proceeded some distance, when he stopped short and seemed about to retrace his steps.