rrodes and embitters every one it touches.

On the third morning after our instalment in new lodgings--two almost
exactly similar rooms, a little farther away from Mrs. Pelly and
Howard Street, in a turning off the lower Hampstead Road--I received a
letter, forwarded on from our first lodging, from Arncliffe, the
editor to whom, some four years before this time, I had taken a letter
of introduction. At intervals Arncliffe had accepted and published
quite a number of articles from my pen, but we had not again met,
unless one counts the occasion upon which I followed him into an
expensive restaurant at luncheon time, on the off-chance of being
noticed by him. The letter ran thus:

'Dear Mr. Freydon,--As you are probably aware, I am now in the chair
of the _Advocate_, and a pretty uneasy seat I find it, so far. It
occurs to me that we might be able to do something for each other.
Will you give me a call here between three and four one afternoon this
week, if you are not too busy.--Yours sincerely, Henry Arncliffe.'

The letter gave me rather a thrill. Sylvanus Creed had published two
books of mine, and my work had recently appeared in several of the
leading journals. But the _Advocate_ was certainly one of the oldest
and most famous of London's daily newspapers--I vaguely recalled
having read somewhere that it had changed its proprietors during the
past week or so--and I had never before received a summons from the
editor of such a journal. Fanny had a headache and was cross that
morning; but I told her of the letter, and explained that it might
easily mean some increase in my earnings.

'If he would commission me for a series of articles, we might afford
to take a room on the next floor for me to work in,' I said rather
selfishly perhaps.

'Groceries seem to be dearer every week,' said Fanny, 'and Mrs. Heaps
charges sevenpence for every scuttle of coal. I never heard of such a
price. Mother never charges more than sixpence, no matter if coal goes
up ever so.'

This touched a sore spot between us. It seemed Mrs. Pelly had two
rooms empty, and Fanny did not find it easy to forgive me for my
refusal to go and live in Howard Street.

If Arncliffe found his editorial chair an uneasy seat, it was not the
chair's fault. A more dignified and withal more ingeniously contrived
and padded resting-place for mortal limbs I never saw. And the
editorial apartment, how spacious, silent, and admirably adapted, in
the dignity