ll, you should reply only in
the most general terms. Who is this man Dabbs, I wonder, who has the
impudence to write to you in this way?'

'Oh, one of the Hoxton Socialists, I suppose,' Mutimer answered
carelessly. 'I remember the name.'

'A gross impertinence! By no means encourage them in thinking you owe
explanations. Your position doesn't allow anything of the kind.'

'All right,' said Richard, his ill-humour gone; 'I'll see to it.'

He was not able, after all, to catch the early train by which he had
meant to take his brother to Wanley. He did not like to leave without
some kind of good-bye to his mother, and Alice said that the old woman
would not be ready to go before eleven o'clock. After half an hour of
restlessness he sat down to answer Daniel's letter. Keene's flattery
had not been without its fruit. From anger which had in it an element
of apprehension he passed to an arrogant self-confidence which character
and circumstances were conspiring to make his habitual mood. It _was_
a gross impertinence in Daniel to address him thus. What was the use of
wealth if it did not exempt one from the petty laws binding on miserable
hand to mouth toilers! He would have done with Emma Vine; his time was
of too much value to the world to be consumed in wranglings about a
work-girl. What if here and there someone believed the calumny? Would
it do Emma any harm? That was most unlikely. On the whole, the
misunderstanding was useful; let it take its course. Men with large aims
cannot afford to be scrupulous in small details. Was not New Wanley a
sufficient balance against a piece of injustice, which, after all, was
only one of words?

He wrote:

'DEAR SIR,--I have received your letter, but it is impossible for me to
spend time in refuting idle stories. What's more, I cannot see that my
private concerns are a fit subject for discussion at a public meeting,
as I understand they have been made. You are at liberty to read this
note when and where you please, and in that intention let me add that
the cause of Socialism will not be advanced by attacks on the character
of those most earnestly devoted to it. I remain, yours truly,

'RICHARD MUTIMER.'

It seemed to Richard that this was the very thing, alike in tone and
phrasing. A week or two previously a certain statesman had written
to the same effect in reply to calumnious statements, and Richard
consciously made that letter his model. The statesman had probably been
sound