The man started up in bed, resting on his elbow.  “How did you know all this?” asked he.  “Who has told you this?  Who are you?”

The exertion and the rapid speaking brought on another fit of coughing and he fell back on his pillow.

“If what I have said is true,” remarked Quincy quietly, “your brother, Nathaniel, is my father, and I am your nephew, Quincy Adams Sawyer.”

“Who sent you to see me?” asked the man.

“I heard,” replied Quincy, “that a man named James Sawyer was in the Eastborough Poorhouse.  I wrote to my father, and in his reply he told me what I have just said to you.  If you are my uncle, father says to do everything I can to help you, and if he had not said so I would have done it anyway.”

“It is all true,” said the man faintly.  “I squandered the money my father left me.  I married a sweet, young girl and took her to the city.  I tried to introduce her into the set to which I once belonged.  It was a failure.  I was angry, not with myself for expecting too much, but with her because she gave me too little, as I then thought.  We had two children—­a boy named Ray and a little girl named Mary, after my mother.”

“My grandmother,” said Quincy.

James Sawyer continued:  “I took to drink.  I abused the woman whose only fault had been that she had loved me.  I neglected to provide for my family.  My wife fell sick, my two little children died, and my wife soon followed them.  I returned from a debauch which had lasted me for about a month to find that I was alone in the world.  I fled from the town where we had lived, came here and tried to reform.  I could not.  I fell sick and they sent me here to the Poorhouse.  I have had no ambition to leave.  I knew if I did it would mean the same old life.  I am glad you came.  I cannot tell you how glad.  I do not wish for any assistance; the town will care for me as long as I live, which will not be very long; but your coming enables me to perform an act of justice which otherwise I could not have done.”

“Tell me in what way I can serve you,” said Quincy, “and it shall be done.”

“Look outside of the door,” said the man, “and see if anybody is listening.”

Quincy opened the door suddenly and the broad face of Mr. Asa Waters stood revealed.

“I thought I would come up and see if Mr. Sawyer wanted anything.”

“If he does,” said Quincy, “I will inform you;” and he closed the door in Mr. Waters’s face.

Quincy waited till he heard his ponderous footsteps descending the stairs at the foot of the hallway.

“Was old Waters out there listening?” asked Jim Sawyer.

“I don’t think he had time to hear anything,” Quincy replied.

“Come closer,” said Jim; “let me whisper.  I am not penniless.  I have got some money.  I have five thousand dollars in government bonds.  I sold some stock I owned just before I went off on that last debauch, but I didn’t spend all the money.  When I die I want you to pay back to the town of Eastborough every dollar I owe for board.  Don’t let anybody know you got the money from me.  Pay it yourself and keep the balance of it yourself.”