"Reward?"

"Would you like to see it?" asked the old
lady. "Wait a bit."

She stole on tiptoe into the bedroom, took the
old man's keys which lay on his dressing-table,
and, returning, softly opened a bureau, and
signed to Arthur to approach it. He did so,
with like caution, and saw pasted on the
interior of the lid, a paper notice, or placard,
written with a pen and ink, but in large carefully-
drawn capitals, announcing that a "Reward
of Ten Thousand Dutch Guilders would be
paid, on the production, Dead or Alive, of the
Body of Basil Humpage, late Merchant and
Banker of the City of London, an Absconded
Felon."

"In Heaven's name!" exclaimed Arthur, "who
prepared this? It is as false as——"

"Hush!" said the old lady, with a glance
toward the patient. "I think he's a moving.
False! I know it is. Hark, young gentleman.
He done it hisself."

"Himself!"

"I see him a finishing and touching of it up.
He hadn't no copy. It all come out of his own
head, and that head's——"

The matron made a dubious sort of gesture,
but Arthur caught her meaning, and the mystery
flashed upon him. He was aware of the rumours
which had arisen, but which had been utterly
dissipated on investigation, respecting the business
connexion between Humpage and the fraudulent
bankrupt house of Dietrich Brothers. The former
had, indeed, as may be remembered, while
ignorant of the doings of this unhappy firm,
assisted them with certain advances. This
circumstance it was that, preying on the old
merchant's mind, had induced the monomania from
which such strange results had come.

In effect, this was the solution. Pursued by
the belief that an attempt would be made to
apprehend him, but successfully disguising his
fear, Humpage had only watched his opportunity
to escape, when, on the morning of the twelfth
of March, his purpose was precipitated by an
accidental movement in the house, which reached
his ear while dressing. The repeated summons
at his door alarming him more and more, he,
with scarcely a moment's consideration, effected
his desperate exit from the window. Failing in
a first attempt to scramble down by the water-
pipe, and cutting his hand severely in regaining
the room, he secured a piece of rope used for
cording luggage, and, arranging the coil so that
he might draw it after him, this time effected a
safe, and, strange to say, unperceived, descent.

Singular it is, but no less true, that his first
refuge was opposite to his own mansion, in the
house of Mrs. Ascroft! Confused as his judgment
was, the father's fond heart could not part so
quickly with its darling. Where he completed
his disguise was never clearly known, but at
dusk, on the thirteenth of March, there appeared,
as Mrs. Ascroft had truly deposed, a stout
gentleman, of civil demeanour, with light bushy
hair, and profuse beard, who engaged her second-
floor rooms, front and back, and quickly finding
fault, as she further stated, with the stable
disturbances at the back, caused his bed to be
removed to the front room, from whence he
could watch his own house, and the proceedings
of its inmates, at pleasure.

Here he enjoyed a peace, to which (as he
afterwards stated) he had been for many months
a stranger. Though still a slave to the fixed
idea that he had been somehow associated with
the Dietrichs in their guilt, he was aware that
his own affairs were prosperous, and in perfect
order. Those he loved best in the world were
in affluence, and, save for his loss, in happiness.
He might still watch over them unseen, and
there was, in this, a mysterious cunning pleasure,
not remotely akin to the disturbance of his brain,
that determined him to preserve his present
incognito as long as possible—at all events, until
his honest name should be cleared.

It was with great regret that, under the
influence of some new alarm, he gave up his
lodgings at Mrs. Ascroft's, and retired into a
small back street in Westminster, laying aside
his disguise, and simply assuming a false name.

Scarcely established in the Westminster lodging,
his health, hitherto remarkably strong, began
to decline, and so great a change did a few months
make in the appearance of the once hale and
portly merchant, that it was not surprising if, in
the obscurity of the City coffee-houses to which
he resorted, he ran little risk of recognition.
How Bill Brightsom, otherwise Bob Caunter,
discovered his real name and history, is a point
that gentleman thought proper to conceal, the
only satisfaction he would vouchsafe (when, at
a subsequent period, he received a handsome
reward from Arthur) being couched in the
single expression:

"Bless yer, we knows a deal!"

Arthur had found the task of reassuring the
old man as to his daughter neither hard nor
critical; indeed, the greatest difficulty he had
encountered in his treatment of him, was to
dissuade him from an attempt to hasten home
while he had scarcely strength to stir. For
strange as it may seem, either the shock he had
just received, or the rapid decay of his bodily
powers, or both, had freed his mind from its
tyrannous delusion under which he had done this
extraordinary and well-known act of effecting his
disappearance and keeping himself concealed,
for the bare act itself has been on record, long
before now.

However, that very same evening Arthur
Haggerdorn had the happiness of restoring Basil
Humpage, a sane and reasonable man, to his
long-deserted home and loving daughter.

What more remains to tell? It is mortifying
to reflect with how little ceremony important
characters can be swept from the scene, how
heroes may be extinguished in a sentence, how
coquettes may be reformed with a word.