'Well?' said I. 'You have done it now!'
'Is he gone?' he asked.
'He is gone,' said I. 'We shall have the devil to pay with him
when he comes back.'
'You are right,' said the lawyer, 'and very little to pay him with
but flams and fabrications, like to-night's.'
'To-night's?' I repeated.
'Ay, to-night's!' said he.
'To-night's WHAT?' I cried.
'To-night's flams and fabrications.'
'God be good to me, sir,' said I, 'have I something more to admire
in your conduct than ever _I_ had suspected? You cannot think how
you interest me! That it was severe, I knew; I had already
chuckled over that. But that it should be false also! In what
sense, dear sir?'
I believe I was extremely offensive as I put the question, but the
lawyer paid no heed.
'False in all senses of the word,' he replied seriously. 'False in
the sense that they were not true, and false in the sense that they
were not real; false in the sense that I boasted, and in the sense
that I lied. How can I arrest him? Your uncle burned the papers!
I told you so--but doubtless you have forgotten--the day I first
saw you in Edinburgh Castle. It was an act of generosity; I have
seen many of these acts, and always regretted--always regretted!
"That shall be his inheritance," he said, as the papers burned; he
did not mean that it should have proved so rich a one.
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