“Ah!” said Miss Eliza, leaning back in her chair—for high tragedy is exhausting—“Ah! how fortunate it is that Mr. Gould presented himself in time. He wishes to renew his acquaintance. With him a sure foundation of a family compact exist—that interview with the old gentleman was a masterpiece. If—if the young man should prove treacherous, like the heart traitor who has just left me, there is still this elderly person, rich as Vanderbilt, almost, and not so very old. He admired me greatly; I could see it in the twinkle of his eyes, in the smile that flitted across his lips. But only as a last resort—only as a last resort.” CHAPTER XXI. A HUNGRY HEART. It was the last day of the Burns family in that tenement-house. The landlady was breaking her heart over their departure. She felt as if she had driven them from beneath her roof, with unjust suspicions, and lamented her fault with noisy grief, that distressed that dear old lady, and brought the kindest assurance from Anna, who came out of her own sorrows to comfort her old friend. “I wouldn’t care about the rent, Mrs. Burns,” protested the good woman. “You know as well as I do that I could have got more money for the rooms, and can now; but it was like home having you about me. It was respectable; and them children, maybe I ain’t made as much on ’em as I oughter; but it’ll be so lonesome not hearing ’em going up and down stairs, especially Joseph. I don’t say it to praise myself, but I never saw a big, red apple in the market that I didn’t buy it for that boy; and I’d have given you any thing, when the tough times came on you, if I’d only known how.” “You were kind to us—very kind; we shall never forget it,” said old Mrs. Burns. “The children love you dearly.” “And will be agin, if you’ll let me. If these silk-gown friends of yours should ever get tired of being kind, I’m on hand here, just as good as ever. This steel thimble ain’t more faithful to my finger than I will be to you and yours.” Here the good woman fairly broke down, and burying her face in the sailor’s jacket she was making, sobbed violently. “I wont let the rooms yet, though I am back in the rent. Who knows what may happen?” she said, at last, wiping the tears from her eyes. “This ain’t the last time you’ll be under my roof. As for Joseph——Well, I ain’t got words to express my feelings for him!” “He will never forget you,” said the old lady, reaching out her hand, which shook a little—for that hard-faced woman had been a friend to her when she had no other. “And I shall never think of you without a warmer feeling at the heart. But it is not far off. We will come and see you often, and—and——” Here the old lady found herself clasped in the landlady’s arms, and lost her breath in that sudden embrace. “And I’ll come to see you. I hope it’s a palace you’re going to; and then it wouldn’t be good enough.”