It will be almost needless here to add, that Mr. Soloman had, in an interview with the Judge, arranged, in consideration of a goodly fee, to assume the responsibility of the betrayal at the St. Cecilia; and also to bring about a reconciliation between him and the girl he so passionately sought.

“Keep out of the way a few days, and everything will blow over and come right.  I will procure you the Judge’s friendship—­yes, his money, if you want.  More than that, I will acknowledge my guilt to Anna; and being as generous of heart as she is beautiful, she will, having discovered the mistake, forgive me and make amends to the Judge for her foolish act.

It is almost superfluous to add, that the apparent sincerity with which the accommodation man pleaded, had its effect on the weak-minded man.  He loved dearly the girl, but poverty hung like a leaden cloud over him.  Poverty stripped him of the means of gratifying her ambition; poverty held him fast locked in its blighting chains; poverty forbid his rescuing her from the condition necessity had imposed upon her; poverty was goading him into crime; and through crime only did he see the means of securing to himself the cherished object of his love.

“I am not dead to your friendship, but I am too sad at heart to make any pledge that involves Anna, at this moment.  We met in wretchedness, came up in neglect and crime, sealed our love with the hard seal of suffering.  Oh! what a history of misery my heart could unfold, if it had but a tongue!” George replies, in subdued accents, as a tear courses down his cheek.

Extending his hand, with an air of encouragement, Mr. Soloman says nothing in the world would so much interest him as a history of the relations existing between George and Anna.  Their tastes, aims, and very natures, are different.  To him their connection is clothed in mystery.

CHAPTER IX.

In which A gleam of light is shed on the history of Anna Bonard.

A bottle of wine, and the mild, persuasive manner of Mr. Snivel, so completely won over George’s confidence, that, like one of that class always too ready to give out their heart-achings at the touch of sympathy, and too easily betrayed through misplaced confidence, he commences relating his history.  That of Anna is identified with it.  “We will together proceed to New York, for it is there, among haunts of vice and depravity—­”

“In depth of degradation they have no counterpart on our globe,” Mr. Soloman interrupts, filling his glass.

“We came up together-knew each other, but not ourselves.  That was our dark age.”  George pauses for a moment.