"There is no doubt about his being dead?" queried Mr. Bowdoin anxiously.
"Not the slightest. I saw his grave. But, unhappily, Mercedes is dead, too."
"All is for the best," said Mr. Bowdoin philosophically. "Perhaps you'd have married her."
"Perhaps I should," said Commander Harley simply. "Well, I found her at the hospital where he had died, and she died too. This little girl was all she had left. I brought her back. As you see, she is like her mother, only gentler, and her mother brought her up to reverence old Jamie above all things on earth."
"It was time," said Mr. Bowdoin dryly.
"She told me St. Clair had got into trouble in New York; and old Jamie had sent them some large sum,—over twenty thousand dollars."
Mr. Bowdoin started. "The child told you this?"
"No, the mother. I saw her before she died."
"Oh," said his grandfather. "You did not tell me that."
"I saw her before she died," said Harley firmly. "You must not think hardly of her; she was very changed." The tears were in Commander Harleston's eyes.