"It is not the first case of forestalling I have known," said he; "and it must just be looked on as a bit of bad luck. Better fortune next time. By the way, there is another little circumstance connected with that book—perhaps I should not mention it—but I will be discreet. No names; and yet you may like to hear that you have got another friend somewhere—somewhere in the background—" It was at this point that Maisrie began to listen, rather breathlessly. "Oh, yes, your friend—your unknown friend—wanted to be generous enough," Mr. Carmichael continued. "He wrote to me saying he understood that I had advanced a certain sum towards the publication of the work; and he went on to explain that as certain things had happened to prevent your bringing it out, he wished to be allowed to refund the money. Oh, yes, a very generous offer; for all was to be done in the profoundest secrecy; you were not to know anything about it, lest you should be offended. And yet it seemed to me you should be glad to learn that there was someone interesting himself in your affairs." The two men were not looking at the girl: they could not see the pride and gratitude that were in her eyes. "And Vincent never told me a word," she was saying to herself, with her heart beating warm and fast. But that was not the mood in which old George Bethune took this matter. A dark frown was on his shaggy eyebrows. "I do not see what right anyone has to intermeddle," said, he, in tones that fell cruelly on Maisrie’s ear, "still less to pay money for me on the assumption that I had forgotten, or was unwilling to discharge, a just debt——" "Come, come, come, Mr. Bethune," said the newspaper proprietor, with a sort of condescending good-nature, "you must not take it that way. To begin with, he did not pay any money at all. I did not allow him. I said ’Thank you; but this is a private arrangement between Mr. Bethune and myself; and if he considers there is any indebtedness, then he can wipe that off by contributions to the _Chronicle_.’ So you see you have only to thank him for the intention—"