The merchant sat for a moment, with his cold eye fixed on his earnest face. "Invariably you say that, eh?" "Invariably, sir." "Humph! I don't!" returned the other, rising abruptly from the chair, and, without another word, he slipped out of the little door as cautiously as he had entered, and again took his seat at his desk. The day wore on with an occasional visit from Arthur, a frequent one from Wilkins, and numerous inquiries sent by all the clerks, who could not help but feel an interest in the young sufferer. By the increased darkness of the room, Guly knew the day must be most gone, and he lay looking upon the little table where one night he had seen Wilkins writing, with the quadroon standing behind his chair--that night which he had remembered so distinctly and pondered on so much. As he lay musing upon that event, his attention was attracted by a singular noise outside his door, and the next moment it was thrown open, and to Guly's utter astonishment the dwarf swung himself in upon his long crutches, with Wilkins, looking like a giant, walking smilingly behind him. "Here's a friend that's true to you, Guly; he misses you, you see, as well as the rest of us." "Hih! hih! Monsieur," chuckled the little man, reaching up and catching hold of Guly's fingers; "I have seen you nowhere to-day; I think you very sick or very dead. I get no picayune to-day, no bean soup. Hih! hih! Monsieur, I miss you very much." "You are kind, to come and see me, my poor friend. It seems very natural to see your face. You are welcome." "Me welcome?" squeaked the dwarf, climbing up with much difficulty into the chair Mr. Delancey had so recently left; "me welcome, Monsieur! Hih! that's mor'n has been said to me these many years--hih! poor deformed little devil that I am!" Guly heard a sound, a strange sound, something between a schoolboy snivel and a sob, and looking up, to his amazement saw a bright tear rolling down his visitor's wrinkled cheek, and his one eye, seeming to lie out farther on his face then ever, was glistening with more. "You have never told me your name," said Guly, hoping to divert his attention. "No,'cause I never thort you cared to know it," returned the other, wiping his eye on the cuff of his coat. "The boys call me King Richard, because, as they say, he was stoop-shouldered like me, Monsieur. They daren't exactly call me humped for fear of my crutches, hih! hih! You can call me Richard, or Dick, or what you choose." "You musn't talk too much to Monsieur," said Wilkins, kindly; "he is too ill to hear much conversation--hurts his head." "Hih! no, I won't hurt him. A picayune, Monsieur: I've had no bean soup, to-day. Pauvre Richard!" Wilkins dropped a piece of silver in the claw-like hand, and went back into the store. The dwarf sat rubbing the dime on his sleeve, brightening it, and looking curiously at it with his one eye, as if to assure himself it was good--then disposed of it somewhere about his person.