ll' said Jonas.

'Done!' cried Montague. 'Wait a bit. Take these papers with you and look
'em over. See,' he said, snatching some printed forms from the table. 'B
is a little tradesman, clerk, parson, artist, author, any common thing
you like.'

'Yes,' said Jonas, looking greedily over his shoulder. 'Well!'

'B wants a loan. Say fifty or a hundred pound; perhaps more; no matter.
B proposes self and two securities. B is accepted. Two securities give
a bond. B assures his own life for double the amount, and brings two
friends' lives also--just to patronize the office. Ha ha, ha! Is that a
good notion?'

'Ecod, that's a capital notion!' cried Jonas. 'But does he really do
it?'

'Do it!' repeated the chairman. 'B's hard up, my good fellow, and will
do anything. Don't you see? It's my idea.'

'It does you honour. I'm blest if it don't,' said Jonas.

'I think it does,' replied the chairman, 'and I'm proud to hear you say
so. B pays the highest lawful interest--'

'That an't much,' interrupted Jonas.

'Right! quite right!' retorted Tigg. 'And hard it is upon the part
of the law that it should be so confoundedly down upon us unfortunate
victims; when it takes such amazing good interest for itself from all
its clients. But charity begins at home, and justice begins next door.
Well! The law being hard upon us, we're not exactly soft upon B; for
besides charging B the regular interest, we get B's premium, and B's
friends' premiums, and we charge B for the bond, and, whether we accept
him or not, we charge B for "inquiries" (we keep a man, at a pound a
week, to make 'em), and we charge B a trifle for the secretary; and in
short, my good fellow, we stick it into B, up hill and down dale, and
make a devilish comfortable little property out of him. Ha, ha, ha! I
drive B, in point of fact,' said Tigg, pointing to the cabriolet, 'and a
thoroughbred horse he is. Ha, ha, ha!'

Jonas enjoyed this joke very much indeed. It was quite in his peculiar
vein of humour.

'Then,' said Tigg Montague, 'we grant annuities on the very lowest and
most advantageous terms known in the money market; and the old ladies
and gentlemen down in the country buy 'em. Ha, ha, ha! And we pay 'em
too--perhaps. Ha, ha, ha!'

'But there's responsibility in that,' said Jonas, looking doubtful.

'I take it all myself,' said Tigg Montague. 'Here I am responsible for
everything. The only responsible person in the establishment! Ha,
ha, ha! Then there are