“Thank you.  How soon can you ship the goods?”

“I am afraid not to-day, as we are very busy.  Early next week we will send them.”

His business concluded, Ben left the store and walked up to Broadway.  The crowded thoroughfare had much to interest him.  He was looking at a window when someone tapped him on the shoulder.

It was a young man foppishly attired, who was smiling graciously upon him.

“Why, Gus Andre,” he said, “when did you come to town, and how did you leave all the folks in Bridgeport?”

“You have made a mistake,” said Ben.

“Isn’t your name Gus Andre?”

“No, it is Ben Barclay, from Pentonville.”

“I really beg your pardon.  You look surprisingly like my friend Gussie.”

Five minutes later there was another tap on our hero’s shoulder, as he was looking into another window, and another nicely dressed young man said heartily:  “Why, Ben, my boy, when did you come to town?”

“This morning,” answered Ben.  “You seem to know me, but I can’t remember you.”

“Are you not Ben Barclay, of Pentonville.”

“Yes, but——­”

“Don’t you remember Jim Fisher, who passed part of the summer, two years since, in your village?”

“Where were you staying?” asked Ben.

It was the other’s turn to looked confused.

“At—­the Smiths’,” he answered, at random.

“At Mrs. Roxana Smith’s?” suggested Ben.

“Yes, yes,” said the other eagerly, “she is my aunt.”

“Is she?” asked Ben, with a smile of amusement, for he had by this time made up his mind as to the character of his new friend.  “She must be proud of her stylish nephew.  Mrs. Smith is a poor widow, and takes in washing.”

“It’s some other Smith,” said the young man, discomfited.

“She is the only one by that name in Pentonville.”

Jim Fisher, as he called himself, turned upon his heel and left Ben without a word.  It was clear that nothing could be made out of him.

Ben walked all the way up Broadway, as far as Twenty-first Street, into which he turned, and walked eastward until he reached Gramercy Park, opposite which Lexington Avenue starts.  In due time he reached the house of Mr. Absalom Peters, and, ascending the steps, he rang the bell.

“Is Mr. Peters in?” he asked of the servant who answered the bell.

“No.”

“Will he be in soon?”

“I guess not.  He sailed for Europe last week.”

Ben’s heart sank within him.  He had hoped much from Mr. Peters, before whom he meant to lay all the facts of his mother’s situation.  Now that hope was crushed.

He turned and slowly descended the steps.

“There goes our last chance of saving the house,” he said to himself sadly.

CHAPTER XI THE MADISON AVENUE STAGE

Ben was naturally hopeful, but he had counted more than he was aware on the chance of obtaining assistance from Absalom Peters toward paying off his mother’s mortgage.  As Mr. Peters was in Europe nothing could be done, and them seemed absolutely no one else to apply to.  They had friends, of course, and warm ones, in Pentonville, but none that were able to help them.