"If what I have said is true," remarked Quincy quietly, "your brother, Nathaniel, is my father, and I am your nephew, Quincy Adams Sawyer."
"Who sent you to see me?" asked the man.
"I heard," replied Quincy, "that a man named James Sawyer was in the Eastborough Poorhouse. I wrote to my father, and in his reply he told me what I have just said to you. If you are my uncle, father says to do everything I can to help you, and if he had not said so I would have done it anyway."
"It is all true," said the man faintly. "I squandered the money my father left me. I married a sweet, young girl and took her to the city. I tried to introduce her into the set to which I once belonged. It was a failure. I was angry, not with myself for expecting too much, but with her because she gave me too little, as I then thought. We had two children—a boy named Ray and a little girl named Mary, after my mother."
"My grandmother," said Quincy.
James Sawyer continued: "I took to drink. I abused the woman whose only fault had been that she had loved me. I neglected to provide for my family. My wife fell sick, my two little children died, and my wife soon followed them. I returned from a debauch which had lasted me for about a month to find that I was alone in the world. I fled from the town where we had lived, came here and tried to reform. I could not. I fell sick and they sent me here to the Poorhouse. I have had no ambition to leave. I knew if I did it would mean the same old life. I am glad you came. I cannot tell you how glad. I do not wish for any assistance; the town will care for me as long as I live, which will not be very long; but your coming enables me to perform an act of justice which otherwise I could not have done."
"Tell me in what way I can serve you," said Quincy, "and it shall be done."
"Look outside of the door," said the man, "and see if anybody is listening."