man who says I am afraid to show my face in the
neighborhood, and I'll horsewhip him publicly before another day is over
his head!"

Pedgift Senior helped himself to a pinch of snuff, and held it calmly in
suspense midway between his box and his nose.

"You can horsewhip a man, sir; but you can't horsewhip a neighborhood,"
said the lawyer, in his politely epigrammatic manner. "We will fight our
battle, if you please, without borrowing our weapons of the coachman yet
a while, at any rate."

"But how are we to begin?" asked Allan, impatiently. "How am I to
contradict the infamous things they say of me?"

"There are two ways of stepping out of your present awkward position,
sir--a short way, and a long way," replied Pedgift Senior. "The short
way (which is always the best) has occurred to me since I have heard of
your proceedings in London from my son. I understand that you permitted
him, after you received my letter, to take me into your confidence. I
have drawn various conclusions from what he has told me, which I may
find it necessary to trouble you with presently. In the meantime I
should be glad to know under what circumstances you went to London
to make these unfortunate inquiries about Miss Gwilt? Was it your own
notion to pay that visit to Mrs. Mandeville? or were you acting under
the influence of some other person?"

Allan hesitated. "I can't honestly tell you it was my own notion," he
replied, and said no more.

"I thought as much!" remarked Pedgift Senior, in high triumph. "The
short way out of our present difficulty, Mr. Armadale, lies straight
through that other person, under whose influence you acted. That other
person must be presented forthwith to public notice, and must stand in
that other person's proper place. The name, if you please, sir, to begin
with--we'll come to the circumstances directly."

"I am sorry to say, Mr. Pedgift, that we must try the longest way, if
you have no objection," replied Allan, quietly. "The short way happens
to be a way I can't take on this occasion."

The men who rise in the law are the men who decline to take No for an
answer. Mr. Pedgift the elder had risen in the law; and Mr. Pedgift the
elder now declined to take No for an answer. But all pertinacity--even
professional pertinacity included--sooner or later finds its limits; and
the lawyer, doubly fortified as he was by long experience and copious
pinches of snuff, found his limits at the very outset of the interv