The wintry rays of the sun were contending unsuccessfully with the strong and cheerful blaze of a bright fire in Charles Yeldham\'s outer room one morning in December, when that hard-working gentleman emerged from his bedroom at an unusually late hour, and glanced with an expression of satisfaction at the fire, the preparations for breakfast, and the heap of letters and other papers which occupied one end of the small table. Charles Yeldham was looking troubled on this particular day, but not as he usually was, f............