your own signature, what are your intentions with
reference to Margaret Mackenzie. Her property, at any rate
for the present, is yours. Do you intend to make her your
wife, or do you not? And if such be your intention, when
do you purpose that the marriage shall take place, and
where?

I reserve to myself the right to publish this letter and
your answer to it; and of course shall publish the fact
if your cowardice prevents you from answering it. Indeed
nothing shall induce me to rest in this matter till I
know that I have been the means of restoring to Margaret
Mackenzie the means of decent livelihood.

I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your very humble servant,

JEREMIAH MAGUIRE.

Sir John Ball, Bart., &c., &c,
Shadrach Fire Office.

Sir John, when he had read this, was almost wild with agony and
anger. He threw up his hands with dismay as he walked along the
passages of the Shadrach Office, and fulminated mental curses against
the wasp that was able to sting him so deeply. What should he do to
the man? As for answering the letter, that was of course out of the
question; but the reptile would carry out his threat of publishing
the letter, and then the whole question of his marriage would be
discussed in the public prints. An idea came across him that a free
press was bad and rotten from the beginning to the end. This creature
was doing him a terrible injury, was goading him almost to death, and
yet he could not punish him. He was a clergyman, and could not be
beaten and kicked, or even fired at with a pistol. As for prosecuting
the miscreant, had not his own lawyer told him over and over again
that such a prosecution was the very thing which the miscreant
desired. And then the additional publicity of such a prosecution,
and the twang of false romance which would follow and the horrid
alliteration of the story of the two beasts, and all the ridicule of
the incidents, crowded upon his mind, and he walked forth from the
Shadrach office among the throngs of the city a wretched and almost
despairing man.

CHAPTER XXIX

A Friend in Need Is a Friend Indeed

When the work of the bazaar was finished all the four Mackenzie
ladies went home to Mrs Mackenzie's house in Cavendish Square, very
tired, eager for tea, and resolved that nothing more should be done
that evening. There should be no dressing for dinner, no going out,
nothing but idleness, tea, lamb chops,