ock returned an:
"Indeed? Money is tight, sir, very tight!" his face instantly taking on
the blank-wall solemnity proper to dealings with this world's main
asset.

Mahony did not at once hand over John's way-soothing letter. He thought
he would first test the lawyer's attitude towards him in person--a
species of self-torment men of his make are rarely able to withstand.
He spoke of the decline of his business; of his idea of setting up as a
doctor and building himself a house; and, as he talked, he read his
answer pat and clear in the ferrety eyes before him. There was a bored
tolerance of his wordiness, an utter lack of interest in the concerns
of the petty tradesman.

"H'm." Ocock, lying back in his chair, was fitting five outstretched
fingers to their fellows. "All very well, my good sir, but may I ask if
you have anyone in view as a security?"

"I have. May I trouble you to glance through this?" and triumphantly
Mahony brandished John's letter.

Ocock raised his brows. "What? Mr. John Turnham? Ah, very good ... very
good indeed!" The brazen-faced change in his manner would have made a
cat laugh; he sat upright, was interested, courteous, alert. "Quite in
order! And now, pray, how much do we need?"

Unadvised, he had not been able, said Mahony, to determine the sum. So
Ocock took pencil and paper, and, prior to running off a reckoning, put
him through a sharp interrogation. Under it Mahony felt as though his
clothing was being stripped piece by piece off his back. At one moment
he stood revealed as mean and stingy, at another as an unpractical
spendthrift. More serious things came out besides. He began to see,
under the limelight of the lawyer's inquiry, in what a muddle-headed
fashion he had managed his business, and how unlikely it was he could
ever have made a good thing of it. Still worse was his thoughtless
folly in wedding and bringing home a young wife without, in this
settlement where accident was rife, where fires were of nightly
occurrence, insuring against either fire or death. Not that Ocock
breathed a hint of censure: all was done with a twist of the eye, a
purse of the lip; but it was enough for Mahony. He sat there, feeling
like an eel in the skinning, and did not attempt to keep pace with the
lawyer, who hunted figures into the centre of a woolly maze.

The upshot of these calculations was: he would need help to the tune of
something over one thousand pounds. As matters stood at present on
Bal