"He said something about some clothes sir," replied the man.

"Show him up," said Maxwell, whose tailor from time to time sent a man round with the latest patterns.

A minute later his man returned showing in John Bellows, who was dressed in seedy black and carried a parcel under his arm. Maxwell frowned.

"Well?" he said, when they were alone.

"I thought I'd call round with these clothes, sir," said Bellows gloomily. "They're hardly suited to a man in my position and I thought you might want them back."

"I don't," said Maxwell. "But you may put them down."

The man put them down on the table and stood looking at Maxwell.

"You haven't got such a thing as a drink about you, I suppose?" he said after a pause, looking round the room for the spirit-case.

Maxwell went to the sideboard and produced a decanter and a glass.

"If you drank less and worked more, you'd get on better in the world," he said.

"That's true, sir," said the other. "That's cruel true. Here's to you, sir, and thank you kindly."

Thanks came rarely from Bellows and perhaps Maxwell valued them unduly in consequence. His heart softened a little.

"How are you getting on?" he asked "Have you got any work?"

"No, sir," replied Bellows.

"You ought to have let me drown," he said.

"I believe you're right," said Maxwell.

"But you didn't," added the other almost sternly. "You jumped into the river and pulled me out. I can't forget that."

"I wish you could," interjected Maxwell.

"But I can't," said Bellows. "I feel you're in a sort of way responsible for ine. So when I'm hard up I naturally turn to you. I can't help myself." "So you're hard up, are you?" said Maxwell grimly.

"Of course, sir," said the other humbly. "You gave me £10 I know, but that's two months ago and here I am, you see, stony-broke. You might lend me another tenner, sir, just to help me along?"

"And if I did lend you £10," said Maxwell, "what chance is there of your paying me back?"

"It is a chance, sir, I must say," returned the other, shaking his head.

"There I don't agree with you." said Maxwell. "I don't think there's a ghost of a chance about it."

The man stood hat in hand contemplating the carpet on which the stain left by his wet clothes was still visible. He showed no inclination to go.

"Well," said Maxwell at last, getting impatient, "what are you waiting for? Why don't you go?"

"I've nowhere to go to," replied the other.

"What the devil's that to do with me?" said Maxwell irritably.

"Oh, sir, don't be hard on me!" said Bellows, beginning to snivel. "I'm a poor man and I've no friends but you, and if you hadn't pulled me out of the water that night I shouldn't be here

If there was one thing Maxwell hated it was emotion. The spectacle of a middle-aged man preparing to blubber in his sitting-room revolted him. In desperation he once more produced his cheque-book and rapidly filled in a cheque.

"Here's another £10," he said, "and remember it's the last. I told you before not to come again. I shall now give orders to my servant not to admit you in future. Be off with you and try to get some honest work."

The man took the cheque and his de parture. Maxwell rang for his servant. "If that person calls again, Parker," he said, "send him away." "Very well, sir," said Parker. Two months rolled by and Maxwell heard no more of John Bellows. Then one day the man's existence was recalled to his mind by Parker.

"That person was here again to-day. sir," he said, as he was assisting his master to dress for dinner.

"What person?" asked Maxwell. "The person who called some weeks back. You gave me orders not to admit him, sir."

pers with Maxwell as the hero. The prospect was more than he could bear.

"No, Parker," he said, "you needn't do that. If you can't get rid of him in any other way, give him five shillings." Parker looked at his master gravely. "Very well, sir," he said.

As Maxwell drove in his hansom to Grosvenor Square where he was dining, he reflected bitterly on the sufferings of philanthropists. This half-drowned man seemed determined to dog his footsteps for the rest of his natural life. After mulcting him of various sums of money, he was now taking away his character with Parker. That admirable servant had evidently come to the conclusion that his master had done something disgraceful, that Bellows knew it and was blackmailing him, and that Maxwell was afraid to hand him over to the police. The Scotch have a superstition that it is unlucky to save any one from drowning. So have the Chinese. Maxwell began to agree with them.

From this time Bellows made a practice of calling at St. James's Street at intervals and receiving five shillings from Parker. Maxwell

"I said you were not at home, sir." "What did he say then?"

"He said he would wait, sir. I told him you were not expected home for some time. I said you were out of town, sir." "You did quite right, Parker." "He was very obstinate, sir. I had some difficulty in getting him to go away. Perhaps I had better threaten him with the police if he comes again?"

This idea, however, did not commend itself to Maxwell. The police would take Bellows into custody, Bellows would tell his story to the magistrate, the magistrate would probably be facetious at his-Maxwell's-expense, and

not make up his mind to put an end to it. At length, however, there came a morning when he met Bellows in person. He was just approaching his door and was in the act of getting out his latch-key when Bellows touched him on the arm. Maxwell turned upon him savagely, the memory of his wrongs quite blinding him to the absurdity of the situation. "What are you slouching round here for?" he asked angrily. "Didn't I tell you you were not to come here again?"

Bellows began to snivel at once. "You're very hard, sir," he said. "You're my only friend and when I ask you for help you treat me like a criminal."

The ingratitude of this remark, coming from a man who was living on his doles, exasperated Maxwell. Impulsively he seized Bellows by the collar and shook him.

At this moment, as ill-luck would have it, two young ladies approached, both of whom Maxwell knew, while the younger of them inspired him with a feeling which, if it was not exactly love, bade fair to become so. Evelyn Allieson was a charming girl of two and twenty. She and Maxwell were kindred souls, both impulsive, both a little inclined to step in where more cautious souls would have refrained from meddling, both prone to jump at conclusions. They had met at several country houses, and Maxwell valued her good opinion more than he would have cared to admit even to himself.

Miss Allieson's astonishment may easily be imagined on coming upon Maxwell at twelve o'clock in the morning in the middle of St. James's Street in the act of violently assaulting an elderly man in feeble health and seedy raiment. Her instinct of knight-errantry at once awoke at the spectacle, and leaving her companion she quickened her steps and laid a hand on Maxwell's arm.

"Mr. Maxwell!" she said. "For shame! How can you be so violent? You'll hurt him."

"Hurt him!" said Maxwell wrathfully. "I'll strangle him, confound him!" But he loosed his hold none the less. After all there was something slightly grotesque in a scene of this kind in the middle of the morning and in the middle of St. James's Street.

Bellows, released from his grip, whimpered outright. Evelyn's soft heart was touched at once.

"Oh, Mr. Maxwell," she said, "how cruel of you! Look! He's crying."

At this Bellows wept with increased fervor.

"What has he done?" she went on.

"I believe you were going to strike him! Mr. Maxwell, how could you?”

Maxwell said nothing. He had the most satisfactory explanation in the world to offer, but ill-temper mastered him and he could not utter a word.

"Well?" said Evelyn, "why don't you tell me? I think you ought to tell me." But Maxwell was still silent. Bellows, however, who was delighted to find a sympathetic listener, began to pour out his griefs.

"I only asked Mr. Maxwell for help," he snivelled. "Six months ago he pulled me out of the river when I was trying to drown myself and just now, when I saw him, I asked him to help me. I thought he would do something for me. If it weren't for him I should be dead and give no trouble to any one."

"Hush!" said Evelyn. "You mustn't talk like that. It's very wrong for anybody to kill himself."

"I had nothing to eat," answered Bellows with a gush of self-pity.

"Poor man!" said Evelyn. “And did Mr. Maxwell save you?"

"Yes. He saved me and now he won't help me."

Evelyn turned to Maxwell with virtuous indignation in her pretty gray eyes. "Mr. Maxwell, I'm ashamed of you," she said. "I thought you had a better nature. You must give him some money at once."

Too angry to explain or remonstrate Maxwell felt in his pockets, produced a sovereign purse and handed it to her in silence. To give the money to Bellows himself would have been too much humiliation.

hands with him," Evelyn went on more gently, "just to show you're sorry for having been so unkind."

Bellows held out a dirty hand. "I'm agreeable," he said handsomely. But this was more than Maxwell could put up with. "I'm hanged if I will," he answered sulkily.

"Not when I ask you?" said Evelyn. Her gray eyes were very appealing at that moment. But Maxwell was too angry to notice them, too angry to realize the absurdity of taking the situation seriously.

"No," he said curtly.

"Good-bye, then," said Evelyn, and, with a cold little bow she joined her cousin and the two walked on towards Piccadilly.

Maxwell looked after her retreating figure with a new pain at his heart. He had offended her now. Not content with draining him of money Bellows was bent on alienating his friends. He turned to pour out upon that worthy some of the bitterness which he felt, but Bellows had prudently seized the moment to retire and was nowhere to be seen.

One revenge, however, was open to Maxwell. Evelyn Allieson might never quite forgive him (and it is the painful duty of this chronicler to admit that she never did), Parker might form some new discreditable theory of his master's action, Bellows might make a scene on his doorstep and get himself taken up by the police, paragraphs might fill the evening papers narrating Maxwell's impulsive leap into the river and his tardy repentance of that good action, but on one thing he was resolved; no more money should be forthcoming for Bellows from his pocket. He would instruct Parker at once to that effect.

He did so, and, slightly cheered by this tardy act of vengeance, went to Juncheon at his club. At last, he felt,

he had got rid of Bellows. He had

told Parker that he wished to hear no more of him; and Parker, who was accustomed to take his instructions literally, would not even mention the fact if Bellows again attempted to call at his rooms.

Fate, however, ordained that one more meeting should take place between Maxwell and his persecutor.

This happened one night in May about two months after the disastrous encounter in St. James's Street. Maxwell had spent the evening at the House of Commons, where for once an interesting debate had been in progress. The Strangers' Gallery had been crowded and the air suffocating, and when at last midnight struck and the debate stood adjourned he was glad to escape to the fresher atmosphere outside. The night was warm but a faint breeze from the river tempered it agreeably and, to enjoy this for a moment, Maxwell turned his steps towards Westminster Bridge. The moon had not yet risen and through the haze of the calm summer night the long line of lamps on the Embankment stretched away into the distance, while on the Surrey side illuminated advertisements of somebody's whisky flashed upon the night at intervals of half a minute to remind the gazer, if reminder were needed, that we are a vulgar nation.

Maxwell walked half-way across the bridge and then stood for a moment leaning against the parapet looking down upon the black water below.

He was startled by a voice behind him uttering his name. He turned sharply. "Who are you?" he said, but he knew only too well.

"Look at that now!" said the detested voice of John Bellows. "Here's a gent as'll pull a man out of the river when he's drowning 'isself and in half a year's time 'e forgets what he looks like! I call that noble! But"-here he grasped Maxwell by the sleeve with the energy of intoxication-"if 'e can

forget 'is noble conduct, I can't. Strike me dead, I can't," he added, hiccupping slightly.

Maxwell shook him off angrily. "Look here, my man," he said, "I'm tired of you. I've helped you with money again and again, but you always come back. You're a worthless drunken vagabond and I'll have nothing more to do with you."

"Don't say that," said Bellows insinuatingly. "Don't say that, gentleman. I thought you had a feeling 'art for a poor man down on his luck. Give me

a sovereign. I only asks a sovereign." "No," said Maxwell firmly. "Five bob then," said the man. "No!" said Maxwell again. Bellows grew indignant. "Look here, governor," he said, "you pulled me out of the water once and I hope I'm grateful"-Maxwell laughed-"but I can't live on air. If you won't let me drown give me something to eat. That's all I ask."

"No!" said Maxwell for the third time.

"Very well," said Bellows with a drunken attempt at dignity, "then I shall jump into the river, that's all. I give you fair warning."

"My good man," said Maxwell bitterly, "you are at liberty to jump into the river when and where you please as far as I'm concerned. I shan't prevent you. I've had quite enough

The English Review.

life-saving to last me a life-time."

"You don't mean that" said Bellows, leering tipsily. "You're making fun of me. You couldn't see a poor fellow drown and not help him. You 'aven't the 'art."

"I wouldn't rely on that if I were you, my man," said Maxwell.

Bellows scrambled up on to the parapet. "Here goes then," he said theatrically, and poised himself unsteadily on its edge.

Whether he really meant to throw himself into the river or whether he was merely simulating that intention in order to soften the heart of Maxwell, it is impossible to say, and Maxwell himself has never thought it necessary to consider the point. There was a slip, a splash, and in a moment, before Maxwell could stretch out a hand even if he had wished to do so, the body had disappeared in the muddy water thirty feet below.

As chance would have it the bridge at that moment was quite deserted. Not even the ubiquitous policeman was in sight, and if Bellows really wished to drown himself fate for once smiled upon him. Maxwell was a man of impulse. Impulse on that night in September made him leap into the river. Impulse on this night in May bade him walk away as quickly as possible. And he did.

St. John Hankin.

tesy, always cheerful in the matter if not the fashion of his discourse, always ready to talk on any subject that came up-he was Joseph Skipsey, until a year or two before I knew him a pitman working for his living in the pits, a local poet known to many great personages of the south. He was always cheerful, but never exuberant: it may