Katherine obeyed.  When she came to “Florida and Teche debentures, sixty-two and a half to sixty-five and three-fourths,” she was startled by a sort of shrill shout.  “Ay! that’s a rise!  Some rigging design there!  I must write—­I must.  Where, where has that——­harridan hid my glasses?  Why, it is almost twelve o’clock! the boy will be here for the paper immediately.  And the post! the post!  I must catch the post.  Can you write?”

“Oh yes!  Shall I write for you?”

“You shall! you shall! here’s paper”—­rising and opening an ancient blotting-book, its covers all scribbled over with tiny figures, the result of much calculating, he hastily set forth writing materials, his lean, claw-like, dirty hands trembling with eagerness.  “Hear, hear, write fast.”

Katherine, growing a little clearer, and amazed at her own increasing self-possession, drew off her gloves, and taking the rusty pen offered her, wrote at his dictation: 

“To Messrs. Rogers & Stokes, Corbett Court, E. C.: 

“GENTLEMEN,—­Sell all my Florida shares if possible to-day, even if they decline a quarter.

“I am yours faithfully—­”

“Now let me come there!” he exclaimed.  “I’ll let no one sign my name.  I’ll manage that.  There? there!  Direct an envelope.  Oh Lord!  I haven’t a stamp—­not one! and its ten minutes’ walk to the post-office.”

“I think—­I believe I have a stamp,” said Katherine, drawing her slender purse from her pocket and opening it.

“Have you?” eagerly.  “Give it to me.  Stick it on!  Go! go!  There is a pillar just outside the left-hand gate there; and mind you come back.  I will give you a penny.  Ah, yes, you shall have your penny?”

“I hope you will hear me when I return,” she said, appealingly, as she left the room.

“Ay, ay; but go—­go now.”

When Katherine returned she found the old man, with the half-opened door in his hand, waiting for her.

“Were you in time?” he asked, eagerly.

“Oh yes, quite.  I saw the postman coming across the road to empty the box as I was dropping the letter in.”

“That’s well.  I will rest a bit now, and you can tell me what you please.  First, what have you come here for?”

It was an appalling question, and nothing but the simple truth occurred to her as an answer.  Indeed, some irresistible power seemed to compel the reply, spoken very low and distinct, “I came here to beg.”

The old man burst into a singularly unpleasant laugh.  “Well, I like candor.  Pray what business have you to beg from me?”

“Because I know no one else to turn to—­because, you are so near a kinsman.  Let me tell you about my mother.”  Simply and shortly she gave the history of their life and struggles, of the coming of her brother’s young widow and orphans, of the disappointment of her mother’s literary expectations, of the present necessity.  The quiver in her young voice, the pathetic earnestness with which she told her story, the deep love for her mother breathing through the recital, might well have moved a heart of ordinary coldness, but it seemed to small impression on her grim uncle.