, I'm jiggered!"
"Well, I'm blest!" and others of a more complicated nature continued to
issue from his lips.

"What's it all about?" shouted the excited Mr. Vickers.

Mr. Russell looked up and blinked at him. "I can't believe it," he
murmured. "It's like a fairy tale, ain't it? What do you think of it?"

The exasperated Mr. Vickers, thrusting him back in his chair, shouted
insults in his ear until his friend, awaking to the true position of
affairs, turned to the beginning again and proceeded with much unction to
read aloud the document that Mr. Tredgold had given to Selina some months
before. Mr. Vickers listened in a state of amazement which surpassed his
friend's, and, the reading finished, besought him to go over it again.
Mr. Russell complied, and having got to the end put the paper down and
gazed enviously at his friend.

"You won't have to do no more work," he said, wistfully.

"Not if I 'ad my rights," said Mr. Vickers. "It's like a dream, ain't
it?"

"They bought a ship, so I 'eard," murmured the other; "they've got eight
or nine men aboard, and they'll be away pretty near a year. Why,
Selina'll 'ave a fortune."

Mr. Vickers, sitting with his legs stretched out stiffly before him,
tried to think. "A lot o' good it'll do me," he said, bitterly. "It's
young Joseph Tasker that'll get the benefit of it."

Mr. Russell whistled. "I'd forgot him," he exclaimed, "but I expect she
only took him becos she couldn't get anybody else."

Mr. Vickers eyed him sternly, but, reflecting that Selina was well able
to fight her own battles, forbore to reply.

"She must ha' told him," pursued Mr. Russell, following up a train of
thought. "Nobody in their senses would want to marry Selina for anything
else."

"Ho! indeed," said Mr. Vickers, coldly.

"Unless they was mad," admitted the other. "What are you going to do
about it?" he inquired, suddenly.

"I shall think it over," said Mr. Vickers, with dignity. "As soon as
you've gone I shall sit down with a quiet pipe and see what's best to be
done."

Mr. Russell nodded approval. "First thing you do, you put the paper back
where you got it from," he said, warningly.

"I know what I'm about," said Mr. Vickers. "I shall think it over when
you're gone and make up my mind what to do."

"Don't you do nothing in a hurry," advised Mr. Russell, earnestly. "I'm
going to think it, over, too."

Mr. Vickers stared at him in surprise. "You?" he said, disagreeab