There was the difference of many years between the man and the boy, but to no other person was Scheffer in the habit of saying such things. 'I'd like to see Madam Scheffer,' said Paul, with a quiet laugh. Scheffer was indulgent toward that mirth; he smiled as he said: 'Be patient, as I am, and you shall see her. There was a Mrs. Scheffer once--my mother that was; if there's another like her--I believe there is!' 'Can't you draw me her portrait?' 'Perhaps I could, if I cared.' 'But you don't care. Well, I can get it out of Josephine; she remembers your mother.' Paul looked so much like his sister when he named the name of Josephine and of his mother in one breath, that Scheffer could not refuse him. 'Medium size,' he said, 'and built to last. Graceful, as any mother would have been--if--as she was, in spite of hard work--it was her nature, and her nature was a strong one. She has light hair, that curls as if it liked to, and her eyes are blue. It is a fair face, Paul, and she has a kind smile.' 'But tell me her name; for you need not say it's a fancy sketch.' 'May be not; but that, you see, is my secret.' There was no such thing, in reality, as intruding further on this ground. Still, half embarrassed, Mitchell persisted: 'Where is she, though?' 'Where? I can't tell that.' 'With Cromwell?' 'It may be.' 'Would you trust her with him?' 'Is he not to be trusted?' asked August, so quickly as to startle Paul. If Paul was to be startled--but he was not. The teller in the bank had told him--(Paul was one of those persons with whom acquaintances of every quality lodge their secrets)--of the note Scheffer had taken up with so little fuss and so much amazement. He saw that August for a moment suspected that he knew the facts, but he was not yet prepared to confess such knowledge; for he knew as well as Scheffer what Harry Cromwell was to Josephine. So he answered: 'I should say so, August--if any man on earth could be.' 'So I supposed,' said Scheffer, quietly; and Paul hurried back to the old queer topic, and said, half in jest: 'You mean to keep house, Scheffer, I'll be bound.' Scheffer's dark face brightened; he would share with Paul his pleasant dream--the pleasant dream he cherished, though his sober sense denied its possibility, and his consistent realism charged upon him the special folly of fools. 'Aye,' said he; 'there'll be a library in it--but more select than that of the Atheneum you were wishing for! You shall have the freedom of my house, lad--I'll not forget how kind you've been to me. I shall have a flower garden, and a yard deep enough for shade trees like those--but you don't remember the place.' Scheffer got up and walked away to the window. 'I've not the slightest doubt that you'll do everything you say! I vow I wouldn't like to be the man to stand in your way to anything.'