After a longer demur than he was accustomed to raise to any scheme of Margraf's, however wild and chimerical, Charlie at last let his usual submission, and a vague suspicion that his companionship might be dragging Margraf back from attaining a position more worthy of that gentleman's talents, get the better of him. He made a hard fight for the privilege of exchanging letters during the three years, but Eustace remained obdurate. There was to be no communication except under the circumstances and in the manner named. Each was to take care to see the _Daily Telegraph_ every morning in case of such communications; and at the exact expiration of the three years, that is, on the 15th November, 188-, they were to meet at twelve o'clock noon at Charing Cross station. So these two men divided up their little stock of belongings and smaller capital of money, took a third-class ticket each to London, went together to Charing Cross to verify the scene of their future reunion, and shook hands. "We meet here in three years from to-day." "We do, all being well. Good-bye, Charlie." "Good-bye, old fellow." Thus they parted, each on his separate quest for fortune. [Illustration: "GOOD-BYE, OLD FELLOW."] On the evening of the 14th November, 188-, Eustace Margraf, Esq., Director and Chairman of the Anglican Debenture Corporation, Ltd., eke of the General Stock and Shareholders' Protective Union, Ltd., and various other like speculative companies, sat in the luxurious dining-room of his well-appointed residence in Lewisham Park. He had finished his sumptuous but solitary meal, and, reclining in a spacious armchair, sipped his rare old wine. It was three years all but a day since he had parted from Charlie Osborne on Charing Cross Station, and set out with eighteenpence in his pocket to seek his fortune. In that brief time he had rapidly risen to wealth and distinction. Three years ago he was a penniless mechanic, forsaken by Fortune and discontented with his life; to-day he was a rich man, smiled on and courted by Fortune and envied by all her minions, and still he was discontented with his life. It was strange that he should cherish this discontent, for Eustace Margraf, mindful of the fact that he was made for something better than mill work, had matriculated and graduated at the World's University in the Department of Forgery and Theft. He had taken the highest diplomas in fraud; he had passed with honours the test of an accomplished swindler; and in the intricacies of embezzlement he was Senior Wrangler. Yet he was not content; some men are never satisfied. This evening, as he sat sampling his '18 Oporto, with the daily paper at his elbow, he actually felt some amount of regret that he had entered the course for such distinctions--which, by the way, his modesty forbade him publishing to the world at large. Only a select few knew the extent of his accomplishments.