You should have seen him addressing a crowd collected by chance in Hackney or Poplar. The slightest encouragement, even one name to inscribe in the book which he carried about with him, was enough to fire his eloquence; nay, it was enough to find himself standing on his chair above the heads of the gathering. His voice had gained in timbre; he grew more and more perfect in his delivery, like a conscientious actor who plays night after night in a part that he enjoys. And it was well that he had this inner support, this _brio_ of the born demagogue, for often enough he spoke under circumstances which would have damped the zeal of any other man. The listeners stood with their hands in their pockets, doubting whether to hear him to the end or to take their wonted way to the public-house. One moment their eyes would be fixed upon him, filmy, unintelligent, then they would look at one another with a leer of cunning, or at best a doubtful grin. Socialism, forsooth! They were as ready for translation to supernal spheres. Yet some of them were attracted: ‘percentage,’ ‘interest,’ ‘compound interest,’ after all, there might be something in this! And perhaps they gave their names and their threepenny bits, engaging to make the deposit regularly on the day and at the place arranged for in Mutimer’s elaborate scheme. What is there a man cannot get if he asks for it boldly and persistently enough? The year had come full circle; it was time that Mutimer received another remittance from his anonymous supporter. He needed it, for he had been laying out money without regard to the future. Not only did he need it for his own support; already he and his committee held sixty pounds of trust money, and before long he might be called upon to fulfil his engagement and contribute a hundred pounds--the promised hundred which had elicited more threepences than all the rest of his eloquence. A week, a month, six weeks, and he had heard nothing. Then there came one day a communication couched in legal terms, signed by a solicitor. It was to the effect that his benefactor--name and address given in full--had just died. The decease was sudden, and though the draft of a will had been discovered, it had no signature, and was consequently inoperative. But--pursued the lawyer--it having been the intention of the deceased to bequeath to Mutimer an annuity of five hundred pounds for nine years, the administrators were unwilling altogether to neglect their friend’s wish, and begged to make an offer of the one year’s payment which it seemed was already due. For more than that they could not hold themselves responsible. Before speaking to Adela, Mutimer made searching inquiries. He went to the Midland town where his benefactor had lived, and was only too well satisfied of the truth of what had been told him. He came back with his final five hundred pounds.