!'

But Mr. Peagrum was quite unperturbed; if anything, his smudgy features
wore a look of sombre complacency as he came towards them. 'I'm sorry
this should have occurred,' he said,'but you'll bear me out that I
warned yer as something was bound to 'appen. In course I couldn't tell
what form it might take, and fire I must say I did _not_ expect. I
'adn't on'y been in the place not a quarter of a hour, watering the
gaselier in the libery--the libery as _was_, I _should_ say--when it
struck me I'd forgot my screw-driver, so, fortunately, as things turned
out, I went 'ome to my place to get it, and I come back to see the place
all in a blaze. It's fate, that's what it is--fate's at the bottom o'
this 'ere job!'

'Much more likely to be a lighted candle,' said George.

'I was not on the premises at the time, so I can't say; but, be that 'ow
it may, there's no denying it's a singler thing the way my words have
been fulfilled almost literal.'

'Confound you!' said George. 'You take good care your prophecies come
off. Why, man, you're not going to pretend you don't know that it's your
own carelessness that's brought this about! This isn't the only house
you've brought bad luck into, Mr. What's-your-name, since you've started
in business!'

'You can't make me lose my temper,' replied the plumber with dignity. 'I
put it down to ignirance.'

'So do I,' said George. 'And if I know anyone who's anxious for a little
typhoid, or wants his house burnt down at a moderate charge, why, I
shall know whom to recommend. Good-day.'

He turned on his heel and walked off, but Ella lingered behind. 'I only
just wanted to tell you,' she said, addressing the astonished plumber,
'that you have done us a very great service, and I, at least, am very
much obliged to you.' And she fluttered away after her _fiance_.

The plumber--that instrument of Destiny--looked after the retreating
couple, and indulged in a mystified whistle.

'_'E_ comes a bullyragging of me,' he observed to a lamp-post, 'and
she's "very much obliged"! And I'm blowed if I know what for, either
way! Cracked, poor young things, cracked, the pair on 'em--and no
wonder, with such a calamity so recent. Ah, well, I do 'ope as this is
the end on it. I 'ope I shan't be the means of bringing no more trouble
into that little 'ouse--that I kin truly say!'

And--human gratitude having its limits--it is highly probable that this
pious aspiration will not be disappointed, so long, a