`I am sorry to say I can't stay, John,' replied Tom Pinch, who was breathless with the haste he had made in running up the stairs.

`Can't stay!'

`If you'll go on with your dinner,' said Tom, `I'll tell you my reason the while. I mustn't eat myself, or I shall have no appetite for the chops.'

`There are no chops here, my food fellow.'

`No. But there are at Islington,' said Tom.

John Westlock was perfectly confounded by this reply, and vowed he would not touch a morsel until Tom had explained himself fully. So Tom sat down, and told him all; to which he listened with the greatest interest.

He knew Tom too well, and respected his delicacy too much, to ask him why he had taken these measures without communicating with him first. He quite concurred in the expediency of Tom's immediately returning to his sister, as he knew so little of the place. in which he had left her, and good-humouredly proposed to ride back with him in a cab, in which he might convey his box. Tom's proposition that he should sup with them that night, he flatly rejected, but made an appointment with him for the morrow. `And now Tom,' he said, as they rode along, `I have a question to ask you to which I expect a manly and straightforward answer. Do you want any money? I am pretty sure you do.'

`I don't indeed,' said Tom.

`I believe you are deceiving me.'

`No. With many thanks to you, I am quite in earnest,' Tom replied. `My sister has some money, and so have I. If I had nothing else, John, I have a five-pound note, which that good creature, Mrs. Lupin, of the Dragon, handed up to me outside the coach, in a letter begging me to borrow it; and then drove off as hard as she could go.'

`And a blessing on every dimple in her handsome face, say I!' cried John, `though why you should give her the preference over me, I don't know. Never mind. I bide my time, Tom.'

`And I hope you'll continue to bide it,' returned Tom, gaily. `For I owe you more, already, in a hundred other ways, than I can ever hope to pay.'

They parted at the door of Tom's new residence. John Westlock, sitting in the cab, and, catching a glimpse of a blooming little busy creature darting out to kiss Tom and to help him with his box, would not have had the least objection to change places with him.

Well! she was a cheerful little thing; and had a quaint, bright quietness about her that was infinitely pleasant. Surely she was the best sauce for chops ever invented. The potatoes seemed to take a pleasure in sending up their grateful steam before her; the froth upon the pint of porter pouted to attract her notice. But it was all in vain. She saw nothing but Tom. Tom was the first and last thing in the world.

As she sat opposite to Tom at supper, fingering one of Tom's pet tunes upon the table-cloth, and smiling in his face, he had never been so happy in his life.