"He has written to me, more than once, a begging letter. My name doesn't matter; I'll only say now that he used to know me slightly long ago. I wish to ask you whether he is really in want."
Alexander hesitated, with much screwing of the features.
"Well, he may be, now and then," was his reply at length. "I have helped him, but, to tell the truth, it's not much good. So far as I know, he has no regular supplies—but it's his own fault."
"Exactly." Olga evidently approached a point still more delicate. "I presume he has worn out the patience of both brothers?"
"Ah!" The agent shook his head, "I'm sorry to say that the other's patience—I see you know something of our family circumstances—never allowed itself to be tried. He's very well off, I believe, but he'll do nothing for poor Dan, and never would. I'm bound to admit Dan has his faults, but still——"
His brows expressed sorrow rather than anger on the subject of his hard-fisted relative.
"Do you happen to know anything," pursued Olga, lowering her voice, "of a transaction about certain—certain letters, which were given up by Daniel Otway?"
"Why—yes. I've heard something about that affair."
"Those letters, I always understood, were purchased from him at a considerable price."
"That's true," replied Alexander, smiling familiarly as he leaned across the table. "But the considerable price was never paid—not one penny of it."