CHAPTER X.
HIGHLY RESPECTABLE.
As old Oliver was stooping over his desk on the counter, and bringing his dim eyes as close as he could to the letter he was writing, his shop-door was darkened by the unexpected entrance of his sister Charlotte herself.
She was dressed with her usual extreme neatness, bordering upon gentility, and she carried upon her arm a small fancy reticule, which contained some fresh eggs, and a few russet apples, brought up expressly from the country.

Oliver welcomed her with more than ordinary pleasure, and led her at once into his room behind.

Charlotte's quick eyes detected in an instant the traces of a child's dwelling there; and before Oliver could utter a word, she picked up a little frock, and was holding it out at arm's length, with an air of utter surprise and misgiving.
"Brother James!" she exclaimed, and her questioning voice, with its tone of amazement, rang very clearly into his ears.
"It's my little Dolly's," he answered, in haste; "poor Susan's little girl, who's gone out with her husband, young Raleigh, to India, because he's 'listed, and left her little girl with me, her grandfather.

She came on the very last day you were here." "Well, to be sure!" cried his sister, sinking down on a chair, but still keeping the torn little frock in her hand.
"I've had two letters from poor Susan," he continued, in a tremulous voice, "and I'll read them to you.

The child's such a precious treasure to me, Charlotte--such a little love, a hundred times better than any gold; and now you're come to mend up her clothes a bit, and see what she wants for me, there's nothing else that I desire.