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What is wrong here, Carper?" said William Harris, as he shut the door behind him. "I expected to find a corpse from the tone of your note. What's up?"

The commission merchant was a short heavy young man with a big square jaw and keen gray eyes. His face indicated bull-dog tenacity and unlimited courage of the sterner sort.

Carper Harris arose when his brother entered. He was as white as the dead. "William," he said, "I wish I were a corpse!"

"Ho! ho!" cried the cattle-man, dropping into a chair. "There is a big smash-up on the track, that is evident. Which is gone, your girl or your job?"

"Brother," continued Carper Harris, "I am in a more horrible position than you can imagine. I don't know whether you will believe me or not, but if you don't, no one will."

"You may be a fool, Carper," answered the commission merchant, closing his hands, on the arms of his chair, "but you are not a liar. Go on, tell me the whole thing."

Carper Harris drew up a chair to the table and began to go over the whole affair from the beginning to the end. As he proceeded, the muscles of his brother's face grew more and more rigid, until they looked as hard and as firm as a cast. When he finally finished and dropped back into his chair, the cattle-man arose and without a word went over to the window, and stood looking out over the city, with his hands behind his back. There was no indication by which one could have known of the bitter struggle going on in the man's bosom, unless one could have looked deep into his eyes; there the danger and despair which he realized as attendant upon this matter shone through in a kind of fierce glare.

Finally he turned round and looked down half smilingly at his brother. "Well, Carper," he said, "is that all the trouble? We can fix that all right."

"How?" almost screamed young Harris, bounding to his feet, "how?"

The commission merchant came back leisurely to his chair and sat down. His features were composed and wore an air of pleasant assurance. "My boy," he began, "this is tough lines, to be sure, but you are worth a car-load of convicts yet. Sit down then, and I will straighten this thing out in a jiffy. I have been devilish lucky this season, and I now have about sixteen thousand dollars in bank. You have, I happen to know, some five thousand dollars in securities which came to you out of father's estate when it was settled. Turn these securities over to me and go right on to Europe as you intended. I will realize on the securities, and with the money I now have will be enabled to purchase the exchange which you require, and will have it sent to you immediately, so there will be no delay. You can go right on with your business as you intended, and neither old Beaumont nor any other living skinflint will ever know of this robbery."

Carper Harris could not speak. His emotion choked him. He seized his brother's hand and wrung it in silence, while the tears streamed down his face.

"Come, come," said the cattle-man, "this won't do! Brace up! I am simply lending you the money. You can return it if you ever get able. If you don't, why, it came easy, and I won't ever miss the loss of it."

"May God bless you, brother!" stammered Carper Harris. "You have saved me from the very grave, and what is more—from the stigma of a felon. You shall not lose this money by me. I will repay it if Heaven spares my life."

"Don't go on like a play-actor, Carper," said the cattle-man, rising and turning to the door. "Pull yourself together, gather up your duds, and skip out to London. The stuff will be there by the time you are ready for it." Then he went out and closed the door behind him.