During the five or six following years, a number of events occurred bearing more or less seriously upon some of the actors in our story.

With Edward Claire and his family, life had flowed on in an even current; and, but for the fact that his health never fairly recovered from the shock it received in consequence of his having taxed his physical system beyond its capability of endurance, the sunshine would never have been a moment from his threshold.

The important addition made to his income through the new arrangement volunteered by f.a.n.n.y's guardian, gave to his external condition a more favourable aspect. He was no longer troubled about the ways and means of providing for his needful expenses. A much better situation, so far as a higher salary was concerned, had, during this time offered; but, as it required an amount of confinement and labour which he could not give, without endangering his health, he wisely declined the offer.

Far less smoothly had the current of Leonard Jasper's life flowed on. Twice during this period had he received visits from his old acquaintance, Martin, and each time he was made poorer by five thousand dollars. It was all in vain that he struggled and resisted.

The man had no compa.s.sion in him. He cared not who suffered loss, so he was the gainer.

There were other miners at work sapping the foundations of Jasper's fortune, besides this less concealed operator. Parker, the young man who succeeded to the place of Claire, and who was afterward raised to the condition of partner, with a limited interest, was far from being satisfied with his dividend in the business. The great bulk of Jasper's means were used in outside speculations; and as the result of these became successively known to Parker, his thoughts began to run in a new channel. "If I only had money to go into this," and, "If I only had money to go into that," were words frequently on his tongue.

He regarded himself as exceedingly shrewd; and confidently believed that, if he had capital to work with, he could soon ama.s.s an independent fortune.

"Money makes money," was his favourite motto.

Unscrupulous as his partner, it is not surprising that Parker, ere long, felt himself perfectly authorized to use the credit of the house in private schemes of profit. To do this safely, it was necessary to have a friend outside of the firm. Such a friend he did not find it very hard to obtain; and as nearly the whole burden of the business fell upon his shoulders, it was not at all difficult to hide every thing from Jasper.

Confident as Parker was in his great shrewdness, his speculations outside of the business did not turn out very favourably. His first essay was in the purchase of stocks, on which he lost, in a week, two thousand dollars.

Like the gamester who loses, he only played deeper, in the hope of recovering his losses; and as it often happens with the gamester, in similar circ.u.mstances, the deeper he played, the more he lost.

And so it went on. Sometimes the young man had a turn of good fortune, and sometimes all the chances went against him. But he was too far committed to recede without a discovery. There was no standing still; and so newer and bolder operations were tried, involving larger and larger sums of money, until the responsibilities of the firm, added to the large cash drafts made without the cognizance of Jasper, were enormous.

To all such mad schemes the end must come; and the end came in this instance. Failing to procure, by outside operations, sufficient money to meet several large notes, he was forced to divulge a part of his iniquity to Jasper, in order to save the credit of the firm. Suspicion of a deeper fraud being thereby aroused in the mind of his partner, time, and a sifting investigation of the affairs of the house, revealed the astounding fact that Parker had abstracted in money, and given the notes of the firm for his own use, to the enormous amount of fifty thousand dollars.

A dissolution of co-partnership took place in consequence. Parker, blasted in reputation, was dragged before a court of justice, in order to make him disgorge property alleged to be in his possession. But nothing could be found; and he was finally discharged from custody.

The whole loss fell upon Jasper. He had nursed a serpent in his bosom, warming it with the warmth of his own life; and the serpent had stung him. Is it any wonder?

This circ.u.mstance, the discovery of Parker's fraudulent doings, took place about two years prior to the time when f.a.n.n.y Elder attained her legal age.

The first thought of Jasper, after his separation from Parker, which took place immediately on discovering that he had used the credit of the firm improperly, was to send for Claire, and offer him a salary of a thousand dollars a year, to come in and fill the responsible position as clerk, from which Parker had just been ejected as partner.

"I can trust him fully," said Jasper to himself; "and I don't know anybody else that I can trust. He is honest; I will give him credit for that; too honest, it may be, for his own good. But, I don't know.

Who would not rather be in his shoes than in Parker's?"

For some time Jasper's mind was favourable to making Claire the offer proposed, and he was about writing him a note, when a new view of the case struck him, dependent on the young man's relation to his ward, f.a.n.n.y Elder.

"Oh no, no, no!" said he emphatically, speaking to himself--"that, I fear me, will not do. It would give him too open an access to my books, papers, and private accounts, in which are entries and memoranda that it might be dangerous for him to see."

Jasper sighed deeply as he finished this sentence, and then fell into a musing state. His thoughts, while this lasted, were not of the most self-satisfying character. Some serious doubts as to his having, in the main, pursued the wisest course in life, were injected into his mind; and, remarkable as it may seem for one so absorbed in the love of gain, there were moments when he almost envied the poor, but honest clerk, who had an approving conscience, and feared no man's scrutiny.

It was with no slight reluctance that he finally came to the conclusion that it would be altogether unsafe to take Claire into his employment. And so he cast about for some one to supply the place left vacant by Parker's withdrawal from the business. In his final selection he was not over-fortunate, as the result proved. The new clerk was shrewd, and capable enough, and apparently as much devoted to his employer's interests as Jasper could wish. Had not his own interests been regarded as paramount to those of the merchant, Jasper would have possessed in him a valuable a.s.sistant. But the clerk did not rise superior to temptations which came in his way.

Jasper continued to trade on the close-cutting, overreaching, and unscrupulous system; and under such a teacher his clerk proved an apt learner.

"He cuts right and left," said he to himself, "and why may not I cut left and right when a good opportunity offers?"

Soon he began to "cut left and right," as he termed it, and it was not remarkable that, in his cutting operations, his employer occasionally suffered. The upshot was, after holding his situation a year, that several false entries, in his hand-writing, were discovered in the books of Mr. Jasper. To what extent he robbed his employer, the latter never accurately knew; but he was worse off by at least three or four thousand dollars through his peculations.

Again the question of taking Claire once more into his employment came up in the mind of Jasper. After viewing it on every side, the decision was adverse. He felt that too great a risk was involved. And so he employed one in whom he could confide with less certainty.

Several years had now pa.s.sed since the merchant began to feel the shock of adverse winds. All before was a summer sea, and the ship of his fortune had bent her sails alone to favouring breezes. But this was to be no longer. His ship had suffered not only by stress of weather, but also by the sacrifice of a portion of cargo to save what remained. And, at last, she was driving on toward the breakers, and her safety from destruction only hoped for through the activity, skill, and tireless vigilance of her helmsman.

A few years before, Mr. Jasper considered himself worth between two and three hundred thousand dollars; now, he pa.s.sed sleepless nights in fear of impending ruin. He had trusted in riches; he had called them, in his heart, the greatest good. At his word they had poured in upon him from all sides, until he was half bewildered at sight of the glittering treasures; but, just as he began to feel secure in his possessions, they began to take themselves wings and fly away.

And, alas for him! he had laid up no other treasures. None in heaven; none in the hearts of his wife and children; none in his own mind. The staff upon which he had leaned was now a splintering reed, wounding as it bent under him.

CHAPTER XIX.

There was one point of time to which Leonard Jasper looked with no little anxiety, and that was to the period of f.a.n.n.y Elder's majority, when it was his purpose to relinquish his guardianship, and wash his hands, if it were possible to do so, entirely clean of her. Until the estate left by her father was settled up, the property in her hands and receipts in his, there was danger ahead. And, as the time drew nearer and nearer, he felt increasing uneasiness.

On the very day that f.a.n.n.y reached her eighteenth year, Jasper sent a note to Claire, asking an interview.

"I wish," said he, when the latter came, "to have some conference with you about Miss Elder. She has now, you are no doubt aware, attained the legal age. Such being the case, I wish, as early as it can be done, to settle up the estate of her father, and pay over to her, or to any person she may select as her agent, the property in my hands.

It has increased some in value. Will you consult her on the subject?"

Claire promised to do so; and, at the same time, asked as to the amount of f.a.n.n.y's property.

"The total value will not fall much short of eight thousand dollars,"

replied Jasper. "There are two houses and lots that would sell at any time for six thousand dollars. You live in one of these houses, and the other is rented for two hundred and fifty dollars. Then there are nearly two thousand dollars in six per cent. stocks. When her father died, his estate consisted of these two houses, and a piece of poor land which he had taken as satisfaction for a debt. At the first opportunity, I sold the land and invested the money. This sum, with acc.u.mulations of interest, and rents received for several years, beyond what was required for f.a.n.n.y's maintenance, has now increased to within a fraction of two thousand dollars, and is, as just said, invested in stocks. I think," added Jasper, "that you had better a.s.sume the management of this property yourself. Get from Miss Elder a power of attorney authorizing you to settle the estate, and the whole business can be completed in a very short time. I will make you out an accurate statement of every thing, so that you will be at no loss to comprehend the accounts."

To this there could, of course, be no objection on the part of Claire.

He promised to confer with f.a.n.n.y, and let Jasper know, in a day or two, the result.

Now came a new trial for Claire and his wife. They had taken f.a.n.n.y, when only four years of age, and taken her so entirely into their home and affections, that she had almost from the first seemed to them as one of their own children. In a brief time the earlier memories of the child faded. The past was absorbed in the present; and she loved as parents none other than those she called by the tender names of "father" and "mother." The children with whom she grew up she knew only as her brothers and sisters. This thorough adoption and incorporation of the child into their family was not, in any sense, the work of design on the part of Claire and his wife. But they saw, in the beginning, no reason to check the natural tendency thereto.

When little f.a.n.n.y, of her own accord, addressed them, soon after her virtual adoption, as "father" and "mother," they accepted the child's own interpretation of their relative positions, and took her from that moment more entirely into their hearts.

And so f.a.n.n.y Elder grew up to womanhood, in the full belief that she was the child of Mr. and Mrs. Claire. The new trial through which this excellent couple were now to pa.s.s, the reader can easily imagine.

The time had come when f.a.n.n.y must know the real truth in regard to herself--must be told that she had no natural claim upon the love of those whose love she prized above all things.

It seemed cruel to take away the conscious right to love and be loved, which had so long blessed her. And yet the truth must now be made known, and Mrs. Claire took upon herself the task of breaking it as gently as possible.

A woman in age and stature, yet with all the gentle deference of a daughter, f.a.n.n.y moved by the side of Mrs. Claire with a loving thoughtfulness, daily sharing her household duties. Some months before she had left school, but was still taking lessons in music and French, and devoting a portion of time to practice in drawing, for which she had a decided taste.

On the day after Mr. Claire's interview with Jasper, Mrs. Claire said to f.a.n.n.y, with a seriousness of tone and manner that brought a look of surprise to her face--

"Come to my room with me, dear. I have something to say to you."

f.a.n.n.y moved along by her side, wondering to herself what could be in her mother's mind. On entering the chamber, Mrs. Claire shut the door, and then, as she sat down, with an arm around the young girl's waist, she said, in a thoughtful, earnest voice--

"f.a.n.n.y, I want you to tell me the first thing you recollect in life."

"The first thing, mother?" She smiled at a request so unexpected, and Mrs. Claire smiled in return, though from a different cause.

"Yes, dear. I have a reason for asking this. Now, let your thoughts run back--far back, and recall for me the very first thing you can recollect."

The countenance of f.a.n.n.y grew thoughtful, then serious, and then a half-frightened look flashed over it.