'For what purpose, sir, are you instituting this eager search after my brother? It cannot be that—— No, no—he has left you, you say, more than three years: besides, the bare supposition is as wicked as absurd.'

'The truth is, Mr Lloyd,' rejoined Mr Smith after a few moments' reflection, 'there is great danger that my son may disadvantageously connect himself with your—with your brother's family—may, in fact, marry his daughter Caroline. Now I could easily convince Owen'——

'Caroline!' interjected Mr Lloyd with a tremulous accent, and his dim eyes suffused with tears—'Caroline!—ay, truly her daughter would be named Caroline.' An instant after, he added, drawing himself up with an air of pride and some sternness: 'Caroline Lloyd, sir, is a person who, by birth, and, I doubt not, character and attainments, is a fitting match for the son of the proudest merchant of this proud city.'

'Very likely,' rejoined Mr Smith dryly; 'but you must excuse me for saying that, as regards my son, it is one which I will at any cost prevent.'

'How am I to know,' observed Mr Lloyd, whose glance of pride had quickly passed away, 'that you are dealing fairly and candidly with me in the matter?'

In reply to this home-thrust, Mr Smith placed the letter addressed by Miss Lloyd to his son in the hands of the questioner, at the same time explaining how he had obtained it.

Mr Lloyd's hands trembled, and his tears fell fast over the letter as he hurriedly perused it. It seemed by his broken, involuntary ejaculations, that old thoughts and memories were deeply stirred within him. 'Poor girl!—so young, so gentle, and so sorely tried! Her mother's very turn of thought and phrase. Owen, too, artless, honourable, just as he was ever, except when the dupe of knaves and villains.'

He seemed buried in thought for some time after the perusal of the letter; and Mr Smith, whose cue it was to avoid exciting suspicion by too great eagerness of speech, was growing fidgetty. At length, suddenly looking up, he said in a dejected tone, 'If this is all you have ascertained, we seem as far off as ever. I can afford you no help.'

'I am not sure of that,' replied Mr Smith. 'Let us look calmly at the matter. Your brother is evidently not living in London, and that accounts for your advertisements not being answered.'

'Truly.'