“The sum that has been placed to my credit to-day anonymously. The bank people refused to tell me the name of my benefactor. I look to you, Maude, to solve the mystery. There is only one man whom I know of, rich enough to advance such a sum of money--young enough to do it in so Utopian a manner. There is only one man, Maude, and his name is Francis Tredethlyn. Tell me, my dear, have I guessed rightly?” “You have, papa. Yes, I am sure you have. Poor fellow! and I was so angry with him last night. It was very good of him to do this, papa.” “Good of him!” cried the merchant--“good of him to lend twenty thousand pounds, without a halfpennyworth of security! Upon my word, Maude, it _is_ good; and I can assure you it’s a kind of goodness that is very uncommon in the City.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XVIII. POOR FRANCIS. From the second day of the New Year things went pleasantly enough in the Twickenham household. How could Maude do otherwise than rejoice in the salvation of her father’s honour--to say nothing of his commercial prosperity--even though that salvation had been obtained by a great humiliation on her own part? She would have borne that humiliation very willingly, and would have freely acknowledged her obligation to Francis Tredethlyn, could she have seen Julia Desmond reconciled to her lover. But the separation between these two, which had arisen out of the scene on New Year’s night, was a perpetual reproach to Maude Hillary.