he business, it appeared to be quite plain that Tom was offered a
salary of one hundred pounds a year; and this being the main point, the
surrounding obscurity rather set it off than otherwise.

Tom, being in a great flutter, wished to start for Austin Friars
instantly, but they waited nearly an hour, by John's advice, before they
departed. Tom made himself as spruce as he could before leaving home,
and when John Westlock, through the half-opened parlour door, had
glimpses of that brave little sister brushing the collar of his coat in
the passage, taking up loose stitches in his gloves and hovering lightly
about and about him, touching him up here and there in the height of
her quaint, little, old-fashioned tidiness, he called to mind the
fancy-portraits of her on the wall of the Pecksniffian workroom, and
decided with uncommon indignation that they were gross libels, and not
half pretty enough; though, as hath been mentioned in its place, the
artists always made those sketches beautiful, and he had drawn at least
a score of them with his own hands.

'Tom,' he said, as they were walking along, 'I begin to think you must
be somebody's son.'

'I suppose I am,' Tom answered in his quiet way.

'But I mean somebody's of consequence.'

'Bless your heart,' replied Tom, 'my poor father was of no consequence,
nor my mother either.'

'You remember them perfectly, then?'

'Remember them? oh dear yes. My poor mother was the last. She died when
Ruth was a mere baby, and then we both became a charge upon the savings
of that good old grandmother I used to tell you of. You remember! Oh!
There's nothing romantic in our history, John.'

'Very well,' said John in quiet despair. 'Then there is no way of
accounting for my visitor of this morning. So we'll not try, Tom.'

They did try, notwithstanding, and never left off trying until they
got to Austin Friars, where, in a very dark passage on the first floor,
oddly situated at the back of a house, across some leads, they found a
little blear-eyed glass door up in one corner, with Mr FIPS painted on
it in characters which were meant to be transparent. There was also a
wicked old sideboard hiding in the gloom hard by, meditating designs
upon the ribs of visitors; and an old mat, worn into lattice work,
which, being useless as a mat (even if anybody could have seen it, which
was impossible), had for many years directed its industry into another
channel, and regularly tripped up every