"I have only a word to say to him," replied the visitor. "Perhaps it will be as well for me to go to his room, instead of calling him down." "As you please. My daughter will show you the way." Sarah, a beautiful and stately girl of eighteen, conducted the caller to her brother's chamber, and knocked at the door. Presently Carleton appeared. A slight paleness overspread his features on recognising the Agent, but without losing his self-possession, he invited him to enter the chamber. "I have strange feelings on seeing you!" he observed in a very natural tone of voice. "What you said to me about Howard, has troubled me more than I would have thought it possible. Take a seat. Do you smoke?" "Not before dinner," replied the Agent. He made a rapid observation of the chamber, as he sat down. "You are very comfortably situated here." "I have nothing to complain of. We live rather humbly, but we are not ambitious." Carleton then spoke of his mother and sister, in a manner which touched his visitor deeply. Could it be possible, thought the latter, that he was destined to destroy the peace of that happy family? He shrank with indescribable repugnance from the performance of his duty; but it inexorably urged him to finish what he had begun, and he produced the fatal bank-note. "Not to detain you," said he, "I have some question in my mind with regard to a bill I took this forenoon. I have been referred to you as the person who passed it. Will you see if you recognise it?" Again the swift pallor swept over Carleton's face; but this time it was more marked than before, and his fingers trembled as he examined the bill. "Certainly," said he, "I recognise it. It's a note I changed with Captain Wilkins last night." "It also happens," observed the Agent, "to be a note which, according to an accurate description I have of it, was recently lost in the Southern mails. This is as painful to me, Mr Carleton, as it is unexpected; and I hope you will be able satisfactorily to account for the manner in which you obtained this money." "It is still more painful to me than it can be to you," replied Carleton; "and heaven knows I heartily wish I could not tell how that bill came into my possession. I remembered it, after you left me this morning; and I had a presentiment that trouble would come out of it. I am afraid, sir," Carleton added, after some hesitation,--"I am afraid your suspicions of Howard will prove too well founded!" "Do you mean to say, that Howard is responsible for that bill?" "I will tell you all I know about it, sir. I yesterday sold a colt I had been training the past season. He proved too high-spirited for our use, and I preferred to own a horse my mother and sister would not be afraid to ride after. I sold it to a neighbor of ours, Mr. Fellows. He was to pay me one hundred dollars down,--and this is the money he gave me." Carleton hesitated. The Agent begged him to proceed, as no time was to be lost.