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send him out till lunch-time: the chief bookkeeper"—

The old gentleman's eyes twinkled. "McMurtagh!" he cried (Mr. Bowdoin had always called Jamie so since he came into the bank), "will you kindly step down to my counting-room? I will meet you there in a few minutes, and there are some accounts I want you to straighten out for me."

As Jamie hurried down to the Long Wharf, he pressed his coat tight against him. The letter lay in his pocket, and he felt it warm against his breast.

Neither Mr. James Bowdoin nor Harley was in the little room (it was just as Jamie remembered it when he first had entered it, no pretense of business was made there now), and he tore the letter open. Thus it ran:—

New Orleans, August, 30, 1849.

My dear, dear Jamie,—If I have not written to you it was only because I did not want to bring more trouble on you. But things have gone from bad to worse with us. I feel that I should be almost too unhappy to live, only that David is with me now. [Jamie