It is not our purpose to trace, step by step, the progress of this young man in the work of ruining his father and disgracing himself by dishonest practices in business.  Enough, that in the course of three years, the “enterprising young men,” who made from the beginning such rapid strides toward fortune, found their course suddenly checked, and themselves involved in hopeless bankruptcy.  But, with themselves rested not the evil consequences of failure; others were included in the disaster, and among them Mr. Howland, who was so badly crippled as to be obliged to call his creditors together, and solicit a reduction and extension of the claims they had against him.  To Mr. Howland, this was a crushing blow.  He was not only a man who strictly regarded honesty in his dealings, but he was proud of his honesty, and in his pride, had often been harsh in his judgment of others when in circumstances similar to those in which he was now placed.  To be forced to ask of his creditors both a reduction and an extension, humiliated him to a degree, that for a time, almost deprived him of the power of doing business.  From that time, there was a perceptible change in the man of iron.  His tall, erect form seemed to shrink downward; his head bent toward his bosom, and the harsh lines on his brow and around his less tightly closed lips grew softer.  His indignation against Edward was so great, when he finally comprehended the character of the transactions in which he had been engaged, involving as they did a total absence of integrity, that he turned his back upon him angrily, saying, as he did so—­

“Never come into my presence again, until you come an honest man!”

On the day after this utterance of the father’s indignant feelings, Edward left the city; and it was the opinion of many that he went with a pocket full of money.  They were not far wrong.

Thus, of all his children, only the youngest remained with Mr. Howland.  All the rest were estranged from him; and in spite of all his efforts to push the conviction from his mind, he could not help feeling that he was to blame for the estrangement.

CHAPTER XI.

Nearly eight years from the time Andrew Howland left his home have passed, and we now bring him before the reader as a discharged United States’ dragoon, having just concluded a five years’ service in the far West.  He had enlisted, rather than steal, at a time when he found it impossible to obtain employment, and had gone through the hard and humiliating service of a trooper on our extreme frontier, under an assumed name, omitting to write home during the entire period, lest by any chance a knowledge of his position might be communicated to his mother, and (her memory had never faded) to Emily Winters.  The images of these two, the only ones he loved in the world, were green in his bosom.  They were drawing him homeward with a force of attraction that grew stronger and stronger as the end of his service approached.  Nearly three years had elapsed since he had met any one recently from the East who was able to answer, satisfactorily, the few inquiries he ventured to make; and now he was all impatience to return.