"And as I treat her, so may my own flesh and blood treat me!" The sick man's head fell back exhausted upon his pillow. "Thank God!" he muttered, "now I can die in peace." "Turn your mind away from the vanities and dross of this world," John Girdlestone said sternly, "and fix it upon that which is eternal, and can never die." "Are you going?" the invalid asked sadly, for he had taken up his hat and stick. "Yes, I must go; I have an appointment in the City at six, which I must not miss." "And I have an appointment which I must not miss," the dying man said with a feeble smile. "I shall send up the nurse as I go down," Girdlestone said. "Good-bye!" "Good-bye! God bless you, John!" The firm, strong hand of the hale man enclosed for a moment the feeble, burning one of the sufferer. Then John Girdlestone plodded heavily down the stair, and these friends of forty years' standing had said their last adieu. The African merchant kept his appointment in the City, but long before he reached it John Harston had gone also to keep that last terrible appointment of which the messenger is death. CHAPTER II. CHARITY A LA MODE. It was a dull October morning in Fenchurch Street, some weeks after the events with which our story opened. The murky City air looked murkier still through the glazed office windows. Girdlestone, grim and grey, as though he were the very embodiment of the weather, stooped over his mahogany table. He had a long list in front of him, on which he was checking off, as a prelude to the day's work, the position in the market of the various speculations in which the capital of the firm was embarked. His son Ezra lounged in an easy chair opposite him, looking dishevelled and dark under the eyes, for he had been up half the night, and the Nemesis of reaction was upon him. "Faugh!" his father ejaculated, glancing round at him with disgust. "You have been drinking already this morning." "I took a brandy and seltzer on the way to the office," he answered carelessly. "I needed one to steady me." "A young fellow of your age should not want steadying. You have a strong constitution, but you must not play tricks with it. You must have been very late last night. It was nearly one before I went to bed." "I was playing cards with Major Clutterbuck and one or two others. We kept it up rather late." "With Major Clutterbuck?" "Yes." "I don't care about your consorting so much with that man. He drinks and gambles, and does you no good. What good has he ever done himself? Take care that he does not fleece you." The merchant felt instinctively, as he glanced at the shrewd, dark face of his son, that the warning was a superfluous one. "No fear, father," Ezra answered sulkily; "I am old enough to choose my own friends." "Why such a friend as that?"