It shall not be my fault if I do not come back with my pockets well lined.

The dividends you have just collected will be better in my pockets than in yours." This was what he thought, but he said: "Then I will accept with pleasure.

I suppose I can easily engage someone to bring me back to Melville ?" "Oh, yes; we have a livery stable, where you can easily obtain a horse and driver." The dinner proceeded, and Fairfax made himself unusually social and agreeable, so that Colonel Preston congratulated himself on the prospect of beguiling the loneliness of the way in such pleasant company.

Fairfax spoke of stocks with such apparent knowledge that the colonel imagined him to be a gentleman of large property.

It is not surprising that he was deceived, for the adventurer really understood the subject of which he spoke, having been for several years a clerk in a broker's counting-room in Wall Street.