and them and many more I was going to ask long ago, but I saw
you were"----

"Sir, I perceive that we have positively been absent from your place of
business nearly an hour--your employers will be getting rather
impatient."

"Meaning no offence, sir--bother _their_ impatience! _I'm_ impatient, I
assure you, to know what all this means. Come, sir, 'pon my life I've
told _you_ everything! It isn't quite fair!"

"Why, certainly, you see, Mr. Titmouse," said Gammon, with an agreeable
smile--(it was that smile of his which had been the making of Mr.
Gammon)--"it is only candid in me to acknowledge that your curiosity is
perfectly reasonable, and your frankness very obliging; and I see no
difficulty in admitting at once, that _I have_ had a--motive"----

"Yes, sir--and all that--_I_ know, sir,"--hastily interrupted Titmouse,
but without irritating or disturbing the placid speaker.

"And that we waited with some anxiety for the result of our
advertisement."

"Ah, you can't escape from _that_, you know, sir!" interposed Titmouse,
with a confident air.

"But it is a maxim with us, my dear sir, never to be premature in
anything, especially when it may be--very prejudicial; you've really no
idea, my dear Mr. Titmouse, of the world of mischief that is often done
by precipitancy in legal matters; and in the present stage of the
business--the _present_ stage, my dear sir--I really do see it necessary
not to--do anything premature, and without consulting my partners."

"Lord, sir!" exclaimed Titmouse, getting more and more irritated and
impatient as he reflected on the length of his absence from Tag-rag &
Co.'s.

"I quite feel for your anxiety--so perfectly natural"----

"Oh, dear sir! if you'd only tell me the _least bit_"----

"If, my dear sir, I were to disclose just now the exact object we had in
inserting that advertisement in the papers"----

"How did you come to know of it at all, sir? Come, there can't be any
harm in _that_ anyhow"----

"Not the least, my dear sir. It was in the course of business--in the
course of business."

"Is it money that's been left me--or--anything of that sort?"

"It quite pains me, I assure you, Mr. Titmouse, to suppose that our
having put this advertisement into the papers may have misled you, and
excited false hopes--I think, by the way"--added Gammon, suddenly, as
something occurred to him of their previous conversation, which he was
not quite sure of--"you told me that that Bib