Mr. Fairlie twisted himself round in his chair,
polished the magnifying glass with his delicate cambric handkerchief,
and indulged himself with a sidelong inspection of the open volume of
etchings. It was not easy to keep my temper under these circumstances,
but I did keep it.

"I have come here at great personal inconvenience," I said, "to serve
the interests of your niece and your family, and I think I have
established some slight claim to be favoured with your attention in
return."

"Don't bully me!" exclaimed Mr. Fairlie, falling back helplessly in the
chair, and closing his eyes. "Please don't bully me. I'm not strong
enough."

I was determined not to let him provoke me, for Laura Fairlie's sake.

"My object," I went on, "is to entreat you to reconsider your letter,
and not to force me to abandon the just rights of your niece, and of
all who belong to her. Let me state the case to you once more, and for
the last time."

Mr. Fairlie shook his head and sighed piteously.

"This is heartless of you, Gilmore--very heartless," he said. "Never
mind, go on."

I put all the points to him carefully--I set the matter before him in
every conceivable light. He lay back in the chair the whole time I was
speaking with his eyes closed. When I had done he opened them
indolently, took his silver smelling-bottle from the table, and sniffed
at it with an air of gentle relish.

"Good Gilmore!" he said between the sniffs, "how very nice this is of
you! How you reconcile one to human nature!"

"Give me a plain answer to a plain question, Mr. Fairlie. I tell you
again, Sir Percival Glyde has no shadow of a claim to expect more than
the income of the money. The money itself if your niece has no
children, ought to be under her control, and to return to her family.
If you stand firm, Sir Percival must give way--he must give way, I tell
you, or he exposes himself to the base imputation of marrying Miss
Fairlie entirely from mercenary motives."

Mr. Fairlie shook the silver smelling-bottle at me playfully.

"You dear old Gilmore, how you do hate rank and family, don't you? How
you detest Glyde because he happens to be a baronet. What a Radical
you are--oh, dear me, what a Radical you are!"

A Radical!!! I could put up with a good deal of provocation, but, after
holding the soundest Conservative principles all my life, I could NOT
put up with being called a Radical. My blood boiled at it--I started
out of my chair--I