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194 "If we had been wiser, and had not left him! The boy was in a peculiarly restless mood. Even my wife had observed that since morning."

"And why since morning?"

The lawyer looked at him gravely for a moment. "Did you ever hear of Ruth Glidden?" he asked.

"The orphan heiress? Of course; through the society columns of the newspapers."

"Ruth Glidden and the Brierly boys grew up as the best of friends and neighbours. The elders of the two families were friends equally warm. I believe in my soul that Glidden would gladly have seen his daughter marry one of the Brierly boys. And if things had run smooth—but there! Brierly was accounted a rich man, and he was until less than a year before his death, when the failure of the F. and S. Railway Company, and the North-Western Land concern, within three months of each other, left him a heavy loser. Even then, if Glidden had been alive all might have been well. But he died, two years before Brierly's death, and Ruth went to live with her purse-proud aunt, her father's sister. The two families had resided for years, side by side, on this avenue."

"And where is Miss Glidden now?" asked Ferrars.

"Here in this city since the day before yesterday.