n the head with it as a small taste for himself, Quilp very
deliberately led the way to the wharf, and reached it at between three
and four o'clock in the morning.

'Snug!' said Quilp, when he had groped his way to the wooden
counting-house, and opened the door with a key he carried about with
him. 'Beautifully snug! Call me at eight, you dog.'

With no more formal leave-taking or explanation, he clutched the
portmanteau, shut the door on his attendant, and climbing on the desk,
and rolling himself up as round as a hedgehog, in an old boat-cloak,
fell fast asleep.

Being roused in the morning at the appointed time, and roused with
difficulty, after his late fatigues, Quilp instructed Tom Scott to make
a fire in the yard of sundry pieces of old timber, and to prepare some
coffee for breakfast; for the better furnishing of which repast he
entrusted him with certain small moneys, to be expended in the purchase
of hot rolls, butter, sugar, Yarmouth bloaters, and other articles of
housekeeping; so that in a few minutes a savoury meal was smoking on
the board. With this substantial comfort, the dwarf regaled himself to
his heart's content; and being highly satisfied with this free and
gipsy mode of life (which he had often meditated, as offering, whenever
he chose to avail himself of it, an agreeable freedom from the
restraints of matrimony, and a choice means of keeping Mrs Quilp and
her mother in a state of incessant agitation and suspense), bestirred
himself to improve his retreat, and render it more commodious and
comfortable.

With this view, he issued forth to a place hard by, where sea-stores
were sold, purchased a second-hand hammock, and had it slung in
seamanlike fashion from the ceiling of the counting-house. He also
caused to be erected, in the same mouldy cabin, an old ship's stove
with a rusty funnel to carry the smoke through the roof; and these
arrangements completed, surveyed them with ineffable delight.

'I've got a country-house like Robinson Crusoe,' said the dwarf, ogling
the accommodations; 'a solitary, sequestered, desolate-island sort of
spot, where I can be quite alone when I have business on hand, and be
secure from all spies and listeners. Nobody near me here, but rats,
and they are fine stealthy secret fellows. I shall be as merry as a
grig among these gentry. I'll look out for one like Christopher, and
poison him--ha, ha, ha! Business though--business--we must be mindful
of business