“Indeed, Mr. Tupper,” I said, “you are doing far, far more than I should ever have thought anybody would do for a perfect stranger. And unless I could pay the money for the decayed Home, I should not dream of accepting such a great kindness.” He was quite touched. He blew his nose. “We artists,” he said, “are emotional. There is a magic power in us to find all that is trusting and good and of sweet savour in human nature. And yet goodness and gratitude and proper feeling in the young always move me, as you see me moved now. They are so rare.” He brought out a brown leather purse and took from it half a sovereign. He then called the waiter and paid the bill. “We will go down into the smoking-room,” he said. “No doubt a liqueur will not be amiss.” I’d forgotten all about the time and, in fact, everything else in the world during this fearfully exciting meeting with Mr. Martin Tupper; and the end of it all was that I fished out my first five-pound note for the introduction to Mr. Barrett and my first step on the stage. “It should be guineas,” said Mr. Tupper, “but in your case, and because I have taken a very great personal fancy to you, it shall be pounds. And don’t grudge the money. Go on your way happy in the knowledge that it will greatly gladden a life that has a distinctly seamy side. There is a sad but courageous woman whose eyes will brighten when she sees this piece of paper.” But though he idly threw my note into his pocket as a thing of no account, yet he was a man of the most honourable and sensitive nature. “I cannot,” he said, “leave you without carrying out my part of the contract. I gather that you are rather pressed for time, or I would drive you to the Princess’s Theatre in my private brougham, which is waiting for me near the Mansion House. No doubt the driver thinks I am lunching with the Lord Mayor, as I often do. But to take you just now to the Princess’s Theatre would interfere with your duties at the Apollo Fire Office, which I should be the last to wish to do; so I will write you a personal introduction to my dear friend, Mr. Barrett, and you can deliver it, either to-night or on the next occasion that you go to see him act.” “It will be to-night,” I said. He refused to go until his part was done. “We must avoid even the appearance of evil,” he told me. “You might feel uneasy and suspicious were I to leave you with nothing but a promise. Martin Tupper’s word is as good as his oath, I believe; but it is a hard, a cold, and a cruel world. At any rate, you shall have the letter.”