'It does,' said the Scourge and Destroyer of Property, unconscious of the incongruity. 'Dering, my solicitor, is, I believe, a very honest man. Narrow in his views--wedded to the old school--quite unable to see the advance of the tide. But trustworthy. He belongs to a tribe which is indispensable so long as Property is suffered to exist.' 'Yes--only so long. Property and lawyers will go out hand in hand.' 'And magistrates,' he added with enthusiasm. 'And Courts of Justice and prisons. And criminals, because the chief incentive to crime will be destroyed. What a glorious world without a law, or a lawyer, or a policeman!' 'Mr. Dering, is it? Why, my dear Master, I know something about Mr. Dering. My brother Athelstan was articled to him. He became a managing clerk for him. Then there was trouble about a cheque. Something was wrong about it. He was unjustly blamed or suspected, and he left the House. I wonder, now, whether you could throw any light upon that business of the cheque?' 'I, my dear child? A single solitary cheque at a lawyer's office? How should I possibly know anything about it?' 'Oh! but you might remember this cheque, because, now I think of it, your own name was connected with it. Yes--it was. I am certain it was. The cheque was drawn in March in the year 1882--a cheque for seven hundred and twenty pounds, payable to your order--the order of Edmund Gray.' 'A cheque for seven hundred and twenty pounds? In March 1882? That must have been: yes--yes--that was about the time. Now, this is really most remarkable, child, most remarkable that you should actually hit upon a cheque--one of thousands issued from that office--which I should remember perfectly. Life is full of coincidences--one is always hearing odd things said, meeting faces which one knows.--Well, it is most remarkable, because I received a cheque for that very amount at that very time from Dering. Oh! I remember perfectly. It was when I had a scheme--I thought it then, being younger than I am now--a very good scheme indeed. It was intended for the gradual destruction of Property. I did not understand at that time so fully as I do now the rising of the tide and the direction of the current which is steadily advancing to overwhelm Property without any feeble efforts on my part. Yet my scheme was good so far as it went, and it might have been started with good effect, but for the apathy of the workers. You see, they were not educated up to it. I had already begun upon my scheme by advancing to certain working men sums which should make them independent of their employers until they should have produced enough to sell directly, without the aid of an employer, at their own co-operative stores. Unfortunately, most of them drank the money: the few who used it properly, instead of backing up their fellow-workmen, became themselves employers, and are now wealthy. Well, I thought I would extend this method. I thought that if I got together a chosen band--say, of seventy