“How do you know he has done it?”

“He told me so himself.  I met him as I came along just now; and he told me he was to be married to-morrow and would attend to my business next day.”

“Told you who would?”

“He.  Himself.  Haye.”

“Told you he was to be married?”

“Yes.  Who else?”

“To whom?”

“Why! —­ to his niece —­ ward —­ what is she?  Rose Cadwallader.”

“Mr. Haye and Miss Cadwallader!” said Winthrop.

“To be sure.  What are you thinking of?  What have we been talking about?”

“You know best,” said Winthrop.  “My informant had brought another person upon the stage.”

“Who?”

“A Mr. Cadwallader.”

“There’s no such thing as a Mr. Cadwallader.  It’s Haye himself; and it only shews how all a man’s wisdom may be located in one quarter of his brain and leave the other empty.”

“To-morrow?” said Winthrop.

“Yes; and you and I are invited to pay our respects at eleven.  Haven’t you had an invitation?”

“I don’t know —­ I have been out of town —­ and for the present I must pay my respects in another direction.  I must leave you, Will.”

“Look here.  What’s the matter with you, Winthrop?”

“Nothing at all,” said Winthrop facing round upon his brother.

“Well I believe there isn’t,” said Rufus, taking a prolonged look at him, —­ “but somehow I was thinking —­ You’re a fine-looking fellow, Winthrop!”

“You’ll find wood in the further end of the closet,” said Winthrop smiling.  “I am afraid Mother Hubbard’s shelves are in classical order —­that is, with nothing on them.”

“I sha’n’t want anything more till dinner,” said Rufus.  “Where do you dine?”

“At the chop-house to-day.”

“I’ll meet you there.  Won’t you be home till night?”

“I never am.”

“Well —­till dinner,” said Rufus waving his hand.  And his brother left him.

Turning away from the table and his emptied dishes and fragmentary beef-bone, Rufus sat before the little fireplace, gazing into it at the red coals, and taking casual and then wistful note of various things about his brother’s apartment that told of the man that lived there.

“Spare!” —­ said Rufus to himself, as his eye marked the scanty carpet, the unpainted few wooden chairs, the curtainless bed, the rough deal shelves of the closet which shewed at the open door, and the very economical chimney place, which now, the wind having gone down, did no longer smoke; —­ “Spare! —­ but he’ll have a better place to live in, one of these days, and will furnish it.” —­ And visions of mahogany and of mirrors glanced across Rufus’s imagination, how unlike the images around him and before his bodily eye. —­ “Spare! —­ poor fellow! —­ he’s working hard just now; but pay-time will come.  And orderly, —­just like him; his books piled in order