CHAPTER XX.

One hears of the devotion of a dog to its master, the love of a horse for its rider; such devotion, such love Stella received from the boy Frank. He was a very singular boy, and strange; he soon lost the air of melancholy and sadness which hung about him on the first night of his arrival, and became happier and sometimes even merry; there was always a certain kind of reserve about him. As Stella--knowing nothing of the history of the forged bill--said, he had his thinking fits, when he used to sit with his head in …