part of its proprietor. The clerks had a subdued look, and moved about in an automaton-like manner, like horses thoroughly broken in, or trained dogs going through with their parts. When their master passed through the store, their submissive expression was augmented, if possible; and if his keen eye detected nothing to disapprove, they shot glances of mutual congratulation at each other.

     Geoffrey Haywood was not called a hard employer, noran illiberal man, but those under him well knew that every cent they received was well and dearly earned. Nothing remiss was ever overlooked—no neglect of duty forgotten. When pay-day came, every inattention and inadvertence was found faithfully recorded against the delinquent.

 Mr. Haywood himself was not bad-looking. With an erect, well-proportioned form, a luxuriant black beard and mustache always neatly combed and brushed, a fair complexion and black eyes and hair, he was called a handsome man. He had a fine set of teeth, which glistened brightly through his beard when he opened his mouth to smile. We say when he opened his mouth to smile, yet he seldom smiled. When occasion seemed to call for a look of pleasure, he would part his lips and show his teeth, but no other feature of his face altered its lines; his eyes shone no brighter—there were no crows’ feet at the corners; the embryo smile was nipped in the bud, it vanished into space, it diffused itself behind the glossy beard, and buried itself in the unfathomable depths of the glistening eyes. This movement of the mouth, this attempt at a smile, answered many purposes. It terrified delinquent debtors; it took all the starch out of a clerk whom it was desirable to awe; it sent beggars away abashed at their own audacity; it even said to the minister, “Keep on in your humble efforts, and you may possibly win my approval some day or other.”

     On the day that Carlos Conrad and Leonard Lester arrived in town, Geoffrey Haywood chanced to be looking from the door of his store across the street at the hotel just as the hack drove up. He saw at once that the cousins were strangers, and that they were rather distinguished-looking.

     Consequently he put on his hat and walked slowly over to the hotel, at his even, cat-like pace. No unnecessary noise did he ever make; his boots never creaked, and his cane never thumped the sidewalk or floor.

     He saw on the young men’s trunk the initials “L. L.,” and “C. C.,” and read on the hotel register the names, “Carlos Conrad” and “Leonard Lester.”

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