and a doosid
good-looking one into the bargain, eh, my dear fellow, and much of your
sympathy and respect she would command if she were ugly and humpbacked. O! I know you, Pennell! It’s no use your coming the benevolent
Samaritan over me! You have an eye for a jimper waist and a trim ancle
as well as most men. But I fancy your interest is rather thrown away in
this quarter. Miss Brandt has a thorny path before her. She is a young
lady who will have her own way, and with the glorious example of the
Baroness the way is not likely to be too carefully chosen. To tell the
truth, old boy, I ran away because I was afraid of falling into the
trap. The girl wishes intensely to be married, and she is not a girl
whom men will marry, and so--we need go no further. Only, I should not
be surprised if, notwithstanding her fortune and her beauty, we should
find Miss Harriet Brandt figuring before long, amongst the free lances
of London.”

“And you would have done your best to send her there!” replied Anthony
Pennell indignantly, as he stopped on the doorstep of his Piccadilly
chambers. “But I am glad to say that your folly has been frustrated
this time, and Miss Brandt sees you as you are! Good-night!” and
without further discussion, he turned on his heel and walked upstairs. “By Jove!” thought Ralph, as he too went on his way, “I believe old
Anthony is smitten with the girl himself, though he has only seen her
once! That was the most remarkable thing about her--the ease with
which she seemed to attract, looking so innocent all the while, and
the deadly strength with which she resisted one’s efforts to get free
again. Perhaps it is as well after all that I should not meet her. I
don’t believe I could trust myself, only speaking of her seems to have
revived the old sensation of being drawn against my will--hypnotised, I
suppose the scientists would call it--to be near her, to touch her, to
embrace her, until all power of resistance is gone. But I do hope old
Anthony is not going to be hypnotised. He’s too good for that.”

Meanwhile Pennell, having reached his rooms, lighted the gas, threw
himself into an armchair, and rested his head upon his hands. “Poor little girl!” he murmured to himself. “Poor little girl!”

Anthony Pennell was a Socialist in the best and truest sense of the
world. He loved his fellow creatures, both high and low, better than
he loved himself. He wanted all to share alike--to be equally happy,
equally comfortable--to help and be helped, to rest and depend upon
one another. He knew that the dream was only a dream--that it would
never be fulfilled in his time, nor any other; that some men would
be rich and some poor as long as the world lasts, and that what one
man can do to alleviate the misery and privation and suffering with
which we are surrounded, is very little. What little Pennell could
do, however, to prove that his theories were not mere talk, he did. He made a large income by his popular writings and the greater part
of it went to relieve the want of his humbler friends, not through
governors and secretaries and the heads of charitable Societies, but
from his own hand to theirs. But his Socialism went further and higher
than this. Money was not the only thing which his fellow creatures
required--they wanted love, sympathy, kindness, and consideration--and
these he gave also, wherever he found that there was need. He set
his face pertinaciously against all scandal and back-biting, and
waged a perpetual warfare against the tyranny of men over women; the
ill-treatment of children; and the barbarities practised upon dumb
animals and all living things. He was a liberal-minded man, with a
heart large enough and tender enough to belong to a woman--with a
horror of cruelty and a great compassion for everything that was
incapable of defending itself. He was always writing in defence of
the People, calling the attention of those in authority to their
misfortunes; their evil chances; their lack of opportunity; and their
patience under tribulation. For this purpose and in order to know them
thoroughly, he had gone and lived amongst them; shared their filthy
dens in Whitechapel, partaken of their unappetising food in Stratford;
and watched them at their labour in Homerton. His figure and his kindly
face were well-known in some of the worst and most degraded parts of
London, and he could pass anywhere, without fear of a hand being lifted
up against him, or an oath called after him in salutation. Anthony
Pennell was, in fact, a general lover--a lover of Mankind. And that is why he leant his head upon his hand as he ejaculated with
reference to Harriet Brandt, “Poor little girl.”

It seemed so terrible in his eyes that just because she was friendless,
and an orphan, just because her parents had been, perhaps, unworthy,
just because she had a dark stream mingling with her blood, just
because she needed the more sympathy and kindness, the more protection
and courtesy, she should be considered fit prey for the sensualist--a
fit subject to wipe men’s feet upon! What difference did it make to Harriet Brandt herself, that she was
marked with an hereditary taint? Did it render her less beautiful,
less attractive, less graceful and accomplished? Were the sins of the
fathers ever to be visited upon the children?--was no sympathetic
fellow-creature to be found to say, “If it is so, let us forget it! It
is not your fault nor mine! Our duty is to make each other’s lives as
happy as possible and trust the rest to God.”

He hoped as he sat there, that before long, Harriet Brandt would find a
friend for life, who would never remind her of anything outside her own
loveliness and loveable qualities. Presently he rose, with a sigh, and going to his bookcase drew thence
an uncut copy of his last work, “God and the People.” It had been a
tremendous success, having already reached the tenth edition. It dealt
largely, as its title indicated, with his favourite theory, but it was
light and amusing also, full of strong nervous language, and bristling
every here and there, with wit--not strained epigrams, such as no
Society conversationalists ever tossed backward and forward to each
other--but honest, mirth-provoking humour, arising from the humorous
side of Pennell’s own character, which ever had a good-humoured jest
for the oddities and comicalities of everyday life. He regarded the volume for a moment as though he were considering if it
were an offering worthy of its destination, and then he took up a pen
and transcribed upon the fly leaf the name of Harriet Brandt--only her
name, nothing more. “She seems intelligent,” he thought, “and she may like to read it. Who
knows, if there is any fear of the sad destiny which Ralph prophesies
for her, whether I may not be happy enough to turn her ideas into a
worthier and more wholesome direction. With an independent fortune, how
much good might she not accomplish, amongst those less happily situated
than herself!