nd all the
rest to his only son, Jonas. You needn't trouble yourself to be too
affectionate. You won't get anything by it. What's that?'

It WAS startling, certainly. A face on the other side of the glass
partition looking curiously in; and not at him but at the paper in his
hand. For the eyes were attentively cast down upon the writing, and were
swiftly raised when he cried out. Then they met his own, and were as the
eyes of Mr Pecksniff.

Suffering the lid of the desk to fall with a loud noise, but not
forgetting even then to lock it, Jonas, pale and breathless, gazed upon
this phantom. It moved, opened the door, and walked in.

'What's the matter?' cried Jonas, falling back. 'Who is it? Where do you
come from? What do you want?'

'Matter!' cried the voice of Mr Pecksniff, as Pecksniff in the flesh
smiled amiably upon him. 'The matter, Mr Jonas!'

'What are you prying and peering about here for?' said Jonas, angrily.
'What do you mean by coming up to town in this way, and taking one
unawares? It's precious odd a man can't read the--the newspaper--in his
own office without being startled out of his wits by people coming in
without notice. Why didn't you knock at the door?'

'So I did, Mr Jonas,' answered Pecksniff, 'but no one heard me. I was
curious,' he added in his gentle way as he laid his hand upon the young
man's shoulder, 'to find out what part of the newspaper interested you
so much; but the glass was too dim and dirty.'

Jonas glanced in haste at the partition. Well. It wasn't very clean. So
far he spoke the truth.

'Was it poetry now?' said Mr Pecksniff, shaking the forefinger of his
right hand with an air of cheerful banter. 'Or was it politics? Or was
it the price of stock? The main chance, Mr Jonas, the main chance, I
suspect.'

'You ain't far from the truth,' answered Jonas, recovering himself and
snuffing the candle; 'but how the deuce do you come to be in London
again? Ecod! it's enough to make a man stare, to see a fellow looking at
him all of a sudden, who he thought was sixty or seventy mile away.'

'So it is,' said Mr Pecksniff. 'No doubt of it, my dear Mr Jonas. For
while the human mind is constituted as it is--'

'Oh, bother the human mind,' interrupted Jonas with impatience 'what
have you come up for?'

'A little matter of business,' said Mr Pecksniff, 'which has arisen
quite unexpectedly.'

'Oh!' cried Jonas, 'is that all? Well. Here's father in the next room.
Hallo father, here