Page:The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club.djvu/405

327 THE PICKWICK CLUB. 827

Mr. Phunky bowed. He hSd had the pleasure of seeing the Serjeant, ind of envying him too, with all a poor man's envy, for eight years and a quarter.

" You are with me in this case, I understand ?" said the Serjeant.

If Mr. Phunky had been a rich man, he would have instantly sent for his clerk to remind him ; if he had been a wise one, he would have applied his fore-finger to his forehead, and endeavoured to recollect whe- ther in the multiplicity of his engagements he had undertaken this one, or not : but as he was neither rich nor wise (in this sense at all events) he turned red, and bowed.

" Have you read the papers, Mr. Phunky ?" inquired the Serjeant.

Here again Mr. Phunky should have professed to have forgotten all about the merits of the case ; but as he had read such papers as had been laid before him in the course of the action, and had thought of nothing else, waking or sleeping, throughout the two months during which he had been retained as Mr. Serjeant Snubbin's junior, he turned a deeper red, and bowed again.

direction in which that gentleman was standing.
 * ' This is Mr. Pickwick," said the Serjeant, waving his pen in the

Mr. Phunky bowed to Mr. Pickwick with the reverence which a first client must ever awaken ; and again inclined his head towards his leader.

" Perhaps you will take Mr. Pickwick away," said the Serjeant, "and — and — and — hear anything Mr. Pickwick may wish to communi- cate. We shall have a consultation, of course." With this hint that he had been interrupted quite long enough, Mr. Sergeant Snubbin, who had been gradually growing more and more abstracted, applied his glass to his eyes for an instant, bowed slightly round, and was once more deeply immersed in the case before him, which arose out of an interminable law- suit, originating in the act of an individual, deceased a century or so ago, who had stopped up a pathway leading from some place which, nobody ever came from, to some other place which nobody ever went to.

Mr. Phunky would not hear of passing through any door until Mr. Pickwick and his solicitor had passed through before him, so it was some time before they got into the Square ; and when they did reach it, they walked up and down, and held a long conference, the result of which, was, that it was a very difficult matter to say how the verdict would go ; that nobody could presume to calculate on the issue oi an action ; that it was very lucky they had prevented the other party from getting Serjeant Snubbin ; and other topics of doubt and consolation, common in such a position of affairs.

Mr. Weller was then roused by his master from a sweet sleep of an hour's duration ; and, bidding adieu to Lowten, they returned to the City,