“I am alluding, sir,” said Mr Brown, with sarcastic emphasis, “to the letter I had the honour of addressing to you yesterday, and the substance of which, I flattered myself, you had come to answer in person. My name is Brown.” “I am unfortunate,” said Gilead. “I have much correspondence and a poor memory, and a name, however distinctive, is apt to slip me. I devoted, I am afraid, but a cursory examination to this morning’s letters. The penalty is mine.” Mr Brown bowed stiffly. “Assuredly not, sir, since, it seems, I have appealed to your munificence in vain.” “The misfortune, sir,” said Gilead, “is, by your favour, easily amended for both of us.” His courtesy was so charming, that the indignant gentleman was instantly mollified. “You are very good,” he said. “Your frankness invites a warmer confidence than that I had already ventured in a sacred cause. You are acquainted, no doubt, with the name of Mrs Craddock Flight?” Gilead bowed. “Of all the militant sisterhood,” said Mr Brown, “the bright particular star. It was she, if you remember, who chained herself to the wheel of the Prime Minister’s carriage, just as he was about to enter it to drive to the House of Commons, and so forced him to seek his infamous destination on foot. A woman of extraordinary resource and originality.” “Extraordinary,” said Gilead. “If I recollect, she was nearly killed by the horses becoming restive before she could be released.” “She would have been glad to die, sir,” said Brown, “in that glorious situation--a second St Catherine broken on the wheel for her faith.” He looked at his visitor searchingly. “Do not distress me, Mr Balm,” he said, “by affirming that the cause is to be denied its share of the vast resources at your disposal. No, no, you must be with us, sir. It was for that purpose that I wrote to you; it was for that purpose that I identified myself in my letter with a name calculated to shed refulgence on any propaganda to which it should elect to give itself--the name of Mrs Craddock Flight. That name, sir, and that cause lack nothing but the devotion of a sympathetic capitalist to ensure their immortality. It was to that stately name that I questioned the right application of so sugary an epithet as ‘sweet’. Finally, sir, that name--if I may dare the confidence--has pledged itself to become, on a single condition, my priceless possession; to adorn with its widowed lustre my no less widowed insignificance. I confess, sir, that I yearn to bask in that reflected glory--to follow in the tail of its comet-like flight to the new world its radiance is destined to discover to the enraptured vision of posterity.” “You allude--?” said Gilead.