ing towards the House!"

"Ay! see how he speaks of _me_!" interrupted Gammon, with such a
smile!--

"And doesn't he speak so of me? and all of us?"

"He'll let the house tread on him till he can tread on the house, I dare
say."

"But you must own, Mr. Gammon, it shows we've licked him into shape a
bit--eh?"

"Oh, it's a little vile creeping reptile now, and so it will be to the
end of the chapter--of our proceedings; and when we've _done_
everything--really, Mr. Quirk! if one _were_ apt to lose one's temper,
it would be to see such a _thing_ as that put into possession of such a
fortune."

"That may be, Mr. Gammon; but I really--hem!--trust--I've--a higher
feeling!--To right--the injured"---- He could get no farther.

"Hem!" exclaimed Gammon.

The partners smiled at one another. A touch, or an attempted touch at
_disinterestedness_!--and at Quirk's time of life!

"But he's now in a humor for _training_, at all events--isn't he?"
exclaimed Quirk--"we've something now to go to work upon--gradually."

"Isn't that a leaf out of my book, Mr. Quirk?--isn't that exactly
what"----

"Well, well--what does it signify?" interrupted Quirk, rather
petulantly--"I've got a crotchet that'll do for us, yet, about the
matter of law, and make all right and tight--so I'm going to Mortmain."

"I've got a little idea of my own of that sort, Mr. Quirk," said
Gammon--"I've got an extract from Co-Litt--. I can't imagine how either
of them could have missed it; and, as Frankpledge dines with me to-day,
we shall talk it all over. But, by the way, Mr. Quirk, I should say,
with all deference, that we'll take no more notice of this fellow till
we've got some screw tight enough"----

"Why--all that may be very well; but you see, Gammon, the fellow seems
the real heir, after all--and if _he_ don't get it, _no one can_; and if
_he_ don't--_we_ don't! eh?"

"There's a very great deal of force in that observation, Mr. Quirk--it
gives one another view of the subject!"--said Gammon,
emphatically:--and, tolerably well pleased with one another, they
parted. If Quirk might be compared to an old file, Gammon was the
_oil_!--so they got on, in the main, very well together. It hardly
signifies what was the result of their interviews with their two
conveyancers. The two partners met the next morning on ordinary
business; and as each made no allusions whatever to the "crotchet" of
the day before, it may be safely inferred that each had been sati