“Then Bertram is noble,” Cicely timidly put in. “Have you ever doubted it?” “No.” And hiding their blushes on each other’s shoulders, the two girls sat breathlessly waiting, while the clock ticked away in the music-room and the moments came and went that determined their fate. Suddenly they both rose. Mr. Stuyvesant and Mr. Sylvester were descending the stairs. Mr. Sylvester came in first. Walking straight up to Paula, he took her in his arms and kissed her on the forehead. “My betrothed wife!” he whispered. With a start of incredulous joy, Paula looked up. His glance was clear but strangely solemn and peaceful. “He has heard all I had to say,” added he; “he is a just man, but he is also a merciful one. Like you he declares that not what a man was, but what he is, determines the judgment of true men concerning him.” And taking her on his arm, he stood waiting for Mr. Stuyvesant who now came in. “Where is my daughter?” were that gentleman’s words, as he closed the door behind him. “Here, papa.” He held out his hand, and she sprang towards him. “Cicely,” said he, not without some tokens of emotion in his voice, “it is only right that I should inform you that we were all laboring under a mistake, in charging Mr. Bertram Sylvester with the words that were uttered in the Dey Street coffee-house two years ago. Mr. Sylvester has amply convinced me that his nephew neither was, nor could have been present there at that time. It must have been some other man, of similar personality.” “Oh thank you, thank you!” Cicely’s look seemed to say to Mr. Sylvester. “And he is quite freed from reproach?” she asked, with a smiling glance into her father’s face. A hesitancy in Mr. Stuyvesant’s manner, struck with a chill upon more than one heart in that room. “Yes,” he admitted at last; “the mere fact that a mysterious robbery has been committed upon certain effects in the bank of which he is cashier, is not sufficient to awaken distrust as to his integrity, but—” At that moment the door-bell rung. “Your father would say,” cried Mr. Sylvester, taking advantage of the momentary break, to come to the relief of his host, “that my nephew is too much of a gentleman to desire to press any claim he may imagine himself as possessing over you, while even the possibility of a shadow rests upon his name.” “The man who stole the bonds will be found,” said Cicely. And as if in echo to her words the parlor door opened, and a messenger from the bank stepped briskly up to Mr. Stuyvesant. “A note from Mr. Folger,” said he, with a quick glance at Mr. Sylvester. Mr. Stuyvesant took the paper handed him, read it hastily through, and looked up with an air of some bewilderment. “I can hardly believe it possible,” cried he, “but Hopgood has absconded.” “Hopgood absconded?” “Yes; is not that the talk at the bank?” inquired Mr. Stuyvesant, turning to the messenger.