Page:Bleak House.djvu/268

 “No!” cries Mrs. Snagsby from the stairs.

“My little woman!” pleads her husband. “Constable, I have no doubt he'll move on. You know you really must do it,” says Mr. Snagsby.

“I'm everyways agreeable, sir,” says the hapless Jo.

“Do it, then,” observes the constable. “You know what you have got to do. Do it! And recollect you won't get off so easy next time. Catch hold of your money. Now, the sooner you're five mile off, the better for all parties.”

With this farewell hint, and pointing generally to the setting sun, as a likely place to move on to, the constable bids his auditors good afternoon; and makes the echoes of Cook's Court perform slow music for him as he walks away on the shady side, carrying his iron-bound hat in his hand for a little ventilation.

Now, Jo's improbable story concerning the lady and the sovereign has awakened more or less the curiosity of all the company. Mr. Guppy, who has an enquiring mind in matters of evidence, and who has been suffering severely from the lassitude of the long vacation, takes that interest in the case, that he enters on a regular cross-examination of the witness, which is found so interesting by the ladies that Mrs. Snagsby politely invites him to step up-stairs, and drink a cup of tea, if he will excuse the disarranged state of the tea-table, consequent on their previous exertions. Mr. Guppy yielding his assent to this proposal, Jo is requested to follow into the drawing-room doorway, where Mr. Guppy takes him in hand as a witness, patting him into this shape, that shape, and the other shape, like a butterman dealing with so much butter, and worrying him according to the best models. Nor is the examination unlike many such model displays, both in respect of its eliciting nothing, and of its being lengthy; for, Mr. Guppy is sensible of his talent, and Mrs. Snagsby feels, not only that it gratifies her inquisitive disposition, but that it lifts her husband's establishment higher up in the law. During the progress of this keen encounter, the vessel Chadband, being merely engaged in the oil trade, gets aground, and waits to be floated off.

“Well!” says Mr. Guppy, “either this boy sticks to it like cobbler's wax, or there is something out of the common here that beats anything that ever came into my way at Kenge and Carboy's.”

Mrs. Chadband whispers Mrs. Snagsby, who exclaims, “You don't say so!”

“For years!” replies Mrs. Chadband.

“Has known Kenge and Carboy's office for years,” Mrs. Snagsby triumphantly explains to Mr. Guppy. “Mrs. Chadband—this gentleman's wife—Reverend Mr. Chadband.”

“Oh, indeed!” says Mr. Guppy.

“Before I married my present husband,” says Mrs. Chadband.

“Was you a party in anything, ma'am?” says Mr. Guppy, transferring his cross-examination.

“No.”

“Not a party in anything, ma'am?” says Mr. Guppy.

Mrs. Chadband shakes her head.

“Perhaps you were acquainted with somebody who was a party in something, ma'am?” says Mr. Guppy, who likes nothing better than to model his conversation on forensic principles.