'Then I must apologize to Stidger,' I said, 'for supposing him capable of changing his name.' He came to me an hour after, all in a tremble.

'For God's sake, Star,' he said,--always called me Star,--'don't go back on me, but you know family affairs--another woman, beautiful creature,' etc., etc.,--yes, sir, perfectly common, but a blank mistake.

When a man once funks his own name he'll turn tail on anything.

Sorry for this man, Friezecoat, or Turncoat, or whatever's his d----d name; but it's so." The suggestion did not, however, seem to raise the stranger's spirits or alter his manner.

"His name was Jeffcourt, and this here was his mother," he went on drearily; "and you see here she says"-- pointing to the letter again--"she's been expecting money from him and it don't come, and she's mighty hard up.