But spent it must be. And when I consider your Lloyd heredity, your childlike ignorance of the ease with which money is made, and your crushing innocence of the difficulty with which it is spent, I feel I can hardly put my future in better hands than yours. God bless you, my dear nephew, and may your efforts at noble disbursement be attended by success. Your affectionate uncle, Allan D. Lloyd. Robert’s feelings beggared expression. Half dazed, he took out the second enclosure, a brief communication from Messrs. Simons and Hunt, his uncle’s attorneys. This notified him of Mr. Lloyd’s death, and confirmed the fact of his designation as the residuary legatee. After putting an estimate of two million dollars on the minimum value of the estate, Messrs. Simons and Hunt placed their services at the disposal of the heir and announced their readiness to receive his instructions. Followed a blank in Robert’s consciousness. Slowly, very slowly, this was replaced by the sound of the steamer throbbing its way across the Atlantic. *IV* The day after landing, Robert paid Messrs. Simons and Hunt a visit, with the result that, on leaving their offices in lower Broadway, he was a little less haunted by the suspicion that the reality was a dream. A most reassuring item was tucked away in his pocket in the shape of an advance of cold cash amounting to two thousand dollars, a sum far larger than any he had ever been in possession of before. On the theory that excess of joy, like excess of sorrow, had better be skimmed off by a long, brisk walk, Robert trusted to his two legs to get him back to Kips Bay. He had planned no change in his habits as yet; hence he still shared part of a model flat with the sporting editor of one of the evening newspapers. He had just turned from the open court of the Lorillard tenement block into the rather dark entrance, when what appeared to be a shadow on the wall assumed solidity and life, stepped alertly forward, and tapped him on the shoulder. "The one man in New York I particularly want to see," cried Mark Pryor, in his cool, staccato tones. "The one man in New York I particularly want to avoid," retorted Robert, not ill-naturedly, but with a lively remembrance of Pryor as the engineer of his Parisian misadventures. "How in thunder did you know I was back?" "I didn’t. Luck simply drifted my way." His cordial handshake accelerated Robert’s returning sense of the reality of earthly affairs. Pryor might be slim and wiry enough to slip in or out of the most impossible places. He might be as elusive as a ghost. But there was nothing weak or spirituelle about his grasp of one’s hand or his grip on life. As for his voice, which had a ring of decency and good intent always attractive to Robert, it dispelled fanciful grudges and installed common sense.