ased!' cried Dick.

'Deceased. If you had been another sort of nephew, you would have come
into possession (so says the will, and I see no reason to doubt it) of
five-and-twenty thousand pounds. As it is, you have fallen into an
annuity of one hundred and fifty pounds a year; but I think I may
congratulate you even upon that.'

'Sir,' said Dick, sobbing and laughing together, 'you may. For, please
God, we'll make a scholar of the poor Marchioness yet! And she shall
walk in silk attire, and siller have to spare, or may I never rise from
this bed again!'

CHAPTER 67

Unconscious of the proceedings faithfully narrated in the last chapter,
and little dreaming of the mine which had been sprung beneath him (for,
to the end that he should have no warning of the business a-foot, the
profoundest secrecy was observed in the whole transaction), Mr Quilp
remained shut up in his hermitage, undisturbed by any suspicion, and
extremely well satisfied with the result of his machinations. Being
engaged in the adjustment of some accounts--an occupation to which the
silence and solitude of his retreat were very favourable--he had not
strayed from his den for two whole days. The third day of his devotion
to this pursuit found him still hard at work, and little disposed to
stir abroad.

It was the day next after Mr Brass's confession, and consequently, that
which threatened the restriction of Mr Quilp's liberty, and the abrupt
communication to him of some very unpleasant and unwelcome facts.
Having no intuitive perception of the cloud which lowered upon his
house, the dwarf was in his ordinary state of cheerfulness; and, when
he found he was becoming too much engrossed by business with a due
regard to his health and spirits, he varied its monotonous routine with
a little screeching, or howling, or some other innocent relaxation of
that nature.

He was attended, as usual, by Tom Scott, who sat crouching over the
fire after the manner of a toad, and, from time to time, when his
master's back was turned, imitating his grimaces with a fearful
exactness. The figure-head had not yet disappeared, but remained in
its old place. The face, horribly seared by the frequent application
of the red-hot poker, and further ornamented by the insertion, in the
tip of the nose, of a tenpenny nail, yet smiled blandly in its less
lacerated parts, and seemed, like a sturdy martyr, to provoke its
tormentor to the commission of new outrages and