‘Ah! well,’ replied her companion, ‘he is one of the firm, you see, and a great friend of the family; I daresay he has known the poor girl ever since she was born! I wonder who the Cramptons will leave their money to now! Some one told me that this is the last of their family, and the sixth child they have lost, and they have no heir left. It’ll be a nice pot of money for whoever gets it! They are reported to be as rich as Crœsus.’ Mr Crampton said something of the same thing to Henry Hindes that evening, as they sat together in the library at The Cedars. The old man had insisted upon his friend accompanying him home, and the latter had not known how to refuse with any grace. ‘Why I want to speak to you, my dear Hindes, is this,’ said Mr Crampton as they sat in the gloaming together. ‘You see it behoves me now to make a new will! Everything I had was to have gone to my poor girl--that is, after her mother’s death--but that’s all over now; in fact, everything is over for me, and I don’t fancy I shall last long myself.’ ‘You mustn’t say that, my dear friend,’ replied Hindes, in the strange, muffled voice he had adopted of late, and which he attributed to a bad sore throat, ‘you are hale and hearty, and have many years of life, I hope, before you yet, and--when this--this terrible event has somewhat faded from your memory--of enjoyment also.’ ‘No, Hindes, no! I am too old a man to forget so easily. You see it is not as if it were the first nor the second, and it has given me my death-blow, I am certain of that. We men don’t make so much noise about our troubles as the women do, poor things; not that they don’t feel as keenly, perhaps, but their tears are their salvation. Now people, to have heard me talk over this business, might have thought, maybe, that all I cared for was my revenge on the scoundrel who stole my pretty one from me. But it isn’t so--only the other feeling lies too deep for words. But, I am sure of one thing--and that is, that my wife there will outlive me, and that it won’t be so long, either, before she’s a widow. Now, of course, she’ll be provided for amply, and her sister into the bargain; but two women of such quiet tastes and habits can never use one half of the money I have to leave behind me; and who are they to leave it to, when they die? They stand alone in the world. Of course I had meant--I had intended--to leave my Jenny more than half of it--that’s what I’ve been working for all these years--but as it is--’ Here the old man stopped, and, leaning his head on his hand, pressed the burning eyeballs which refused to shed tears, but let his dry heart feed upon itself. ‘My dear friend,’ interposed Hindes, ‘do not pursue this torturing subject to-night, I entreat you. Think of the trial you have already gone through, and have some pity on yourself.’