When Harry reached the city, he went directly home,
and when he got home, the first room he entered was the
office. There sat poor little Seth, among half a dozen
other clerks, copying away for dear life's sake, with a very
sad face. After such kind and familiar salutations as Harry

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delighted to bestow on those beneath him, or in any way in
his power, he went into the next room and shut the door.

“How are you, Emmerson?”

“How d'ye do?” said Emmerson, taking his hand with
both his, and giving him a warm, bland welcome.

“I want you to do me a favour.”

“What is it?”

“I am going to unbosom myself to you, as the young ladies
say, frankly and freely. I never yet knew any good
cause of concealment.”

“You are quite right!” said Emmerson, with a clear
smile; “there's nothing I detest more than duplicity or
double-dealing. But what is it?”

“I am going to London in the packet of Wednesday next,
on a tour of three, four, perhaps five years. The office is
sufficiently taken care of by you, and my advantage in having
at command a substitute so kind and able ought not to
be thrown away. I shall leave all my interests in your
hands, sure to find everything, on my return, ready for me
to set firmly and steadily forth again in my professional career.
But for your ability and fidelity I could not do this.”

“Well, you rate me too highly; but to the point.”

“One reason why I go is, of course, the natural desire of
a young man to see the world.”

“Well: and the other?”

“Listen to me. You are the best, the nearest friend, not
only of myself, but of my father's family. I need not blush
to make you a little confidence.”

“Go on; you know I would do anything to oblige you.”

“You will be surprised to hear, perhaps, that I have not
only been long a very—serious—admirer of Miss Elton,
but that I have had the insane stupidity several times to
suppose she saw, approved, and so forth, and so forth, and
so forth. You understand?”

“Why, not clearly,” said Emmerson.

“In short, then, I offered myself to her; she rejected
me: not simply rejected—she—all but—in fact, she rejected
me. Now I can immediately get the better of this sort of
thing, and I am resolved to leave—to pull up stakes, as they
say, and quit till I get my disappointment under control.
Since my last visit to Rose Hill, I have been struck with a
particularly absurd idea that this young lady has been labouring
under some strange mistake.”

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Emmerson raised his hand as if carelessly to his eyes
and forehead, so as to conceal, however, the change he felt
was taking place in his countenance.

“But for one circumstance, I should give in and place
myself at her feet again.”

“And that circumstance?”

“I stumbled upon you and her the other day on the balcony,
and it-struck me you were speaking and standing in
the character of a lover. Is it so?”

“Your question is rather sudden,” said Emmerson, again
rubbing his brow and eyes with his hands, and turning pallid
with an embarrassment disagreeable to see.

“Understand me,” said Harry. “I have no right to demand
your confidence, but as my going abroad depends
upon your reply, I hope you will let me know. Are you a
lover of Miss Elton?”

Emmerson turned away his face, and busied himself a
moment arranging some papers on the table.

“If Miss Elton have rejected you, I shall postpone my
departure, under the conviction that she loves me. If you
have any, the slightest reason to imagine she means to receive
your addresses—nay, if she even wavered or seemed
to waver, she is either your wife or she is the most accomplished
coquette that ever breathed, and I'm off till my heart
is as free as air.”

“My young friend!” said Emmerson, in a pale whisper,
“she more than wavered. If she mean to accept me or
not, I am not fully prepared to say; that she hesitated, I assure
you, and the impression left on my mind is of a nature
which will not prevent my trying again. This I will say,
however, but in sacred confidence. You must give me your
word never to reveal it.”

“I do.”

“Then this I will say: I had some idea you were attached
to her, and I am not capable of such a base act as
endeavouring to supplant you. I, therefore, particularly
asked her whether any attachment of hers to you ought to
prevent my continuing my addresses. She replied, `No;
he is as far from offering, as I should be from accepting him
if he were to offer!' ”

“Miss Elton said that to you?”

“I swear it!” said Emmerson again, in a whisper.

“Enough. Your statement I cannot doubt in the least.
You even mean more than you say!”

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No answer, but a very significant look.

“Good! give me your hand! I am infinitely obliged to
you for your friendly frankness. I see it has given you
pain to wound me thus, but no matter. I wish you joy. If
you win her, she will bring you happiness unutterable, for
I shall believe she married you from affection; if she jilt
you, why you may have the consolation of knowing you are
not the first, nor the second!”

“But I must lay you once more under a solemn injunction
of secrecy,” said Emmerson. “I would not, even if
she be all you fear, injure the character of the young lady.
You must promise me what I have said shall never go beyond
us two, and also that you will never say you saw me—
you know—on the balcony with her. If I am to be jilted,
of course I wish to conceal my folly.”

“I promise solemnly.”

Harry went out, humming an opera tune.

“What I say is quite true,” thought Emmerson. “She
did waver, and I do mean to pursue it farther, and she did
make use of the remark to me as I stated. Besides, a voyage
to Europe is the best thing this young gentleman can
undertake. Frank in Prairie du Chien, Master Harry in
Jerusalem—the old fellow will follow after him, doubtless,
before a year. I can manage that. And then, if Miss Elton
won't marry me, I don't think I shall be obliged to go
to Europe to recover from the disappointment, although
$ 100,000 settled on herself is a comfortable affair. But,
as matters are going, I don't think I need despair of finding
some suitable alliance. I think my boat sails tolerably
well!”