University of Virginia Library

8. CHAPTER VIII.

Hamlet.

There is something imaginative, if not very picturesque, in
the manner in which the lawyers of Manhattan occupy the buildings
of Nassau street, a thoroughfare which connects Wall street
with the Tombs. There they throng, resembling the remains of so
many monuments along the Appian way, with a “siste viator” of
their own, to arrest the footsteps of the wayfarer. We must now
transfer the scene to a building in this street, which stands about
half-way between Maiden Lane and John Street, having its front
plastered over with little tin signs, like a debtor marked by writs,
or what are now called “complaints.” Among these signs, which
afforded some such pleasant reading as an almanac, was one that
bore this simple and reasonably intelligent inscription:

“Thomas Dunscomb, 2d floor, in front.”

It is somewhat singular that terms as simple as those of first
floor, second floor, &c., should not signify the same things in the
language of the mother country, and that of this land of progress
and liberty. Certain it is, nevertheless, that in American parlance,
more especially in that of Manhattan, a first floor is never
up one pair of stairs, as in London, unless indeed the flight is
that by which the wearied foot-passenger climbs the high stoop
to gain an entrance into the building. In other words, an English
first floor corresponds with an American second; and, taking

that as the point of departure, the same difference exists throughout.
Tom Dunscomb's office (or offices would be the better term)
occupied quite half of the second story of a large double house,
that had once been the habitation of some private family of note,
but which had long been abandoned to the occupation of these
ministers of the law. Into those offices it has now become our
duty to accompany one who seemed a little strange in that den
of the profession, at the very moment he was perfectly at home.

“Lawyer Dunscomb in?” demanded this person, who had a
decided rustic mien, though his dress had a sort of legal dye on
it, speaking to one of the five or six clerks who raised their heads
on the stranger's entrance.

“In, but engaged in a consultation, I believe,” answered one
who, being paid for his services, was the working clerk of the
office; most of the others being students who get no remuneration
for their time, and who very rarely deserve it.

“I'll wait till he is through,” returned the stranger, helping
himself coolly to a vacant chair, and taking his seat in the midst
of dangers that might have alarmed one less familiar with the
snares, and quirks, and quiddities of the law. The several clerks,
after taking a good look each at their guest, cast their eyes down
on their books or foolscap, and seemed to be engrossed with their
respective occupations. Most of the young men, members of
respectable families in town, set the stranger down for a rustic
client; but the working clerk saw at once, by a certain self-possessed
and shrewd manner, that the stranger was a country practitioner.

In the course of the next half hour, Daniel Lord and George
Wood came out of the sanctum, attended as far as the door by
Dunscomb himself. Exchanging “good morning” with his professional
friends, the last caught a glimpse of his patient visitor,
whom he immediately saluted by the somewhat brief and familiar
name of Timms, inviting him instantly, and with earnestness, to

come within the limits of the privileged. Mr. Timms complied,
entering the sanctum with the air of one who had been there
before, and appearing to be in no manner overcome by the honour
he enjoyed. And now, as a faithful chronicler of events, it is
here become our painful, not to say revolting duty, to record an
act on the part of the man who was known throughout Duke's
county as 'Squire Timms, which it will never do to overlook,
since it has got to be perfectly distinctive and characteristic of
late years, not of an individual, but of large classes who throng
the bar, the desk, the steamboats, the taverns, the streets. A
thousand paragraphs have been written on the subject of American
spitting, and not one line, as we can remember, on the subject
of an equally common and still grosser offence against the minor
morals of the country, if deceney in manners may be thus termed.
Our meaning will be explained more fully in the narrative of the
stranger's immediate movements on entering the sanctum.

“Take a seat, Mr. Timms,” said Dunscomb, motioning to a
chair, while he resumed his own well-cushioned seat, and deliberately
proceeded to light a segar, not without pressing several
with a species of intelligent tenderness, between his thumb and
finger. “Take a seat, sir; and take a segar.”

Here occurred the great tour de force in manners of 'Squire
Timms. Considerately turning his person quartering towards his
host, and seizing himself by the nose, much as if he had a quarrel
with that member of his face, he blowed a blast that sounded
sonorously, and which fulfilled all that it promised. Now a better
mannered man than Dunscomb it would not be easy to find. He
was not particularly distinguished for elegance of deportment, but
he was perfectly well-bred. Nevertheless, he did not flinch before
this broad hint from vulgarity, but stood it unmoved. To own
the truth, so large has been the inroad from the base of society,
within the last five-and-twenty years, on the habits of those who
once exclusively dwelt together, that he had got hardened even

to this innovation. The fact is not to be concealed, and, as we
intend never to touch upon the subject again, we shall say distinctly
that Mr. Timms blowed his nose with his fingers, and that,
in so doing, he did not innovate one half as much, to-day, on the
usages of the Upper Ten Thousand, as he would have done had
he blowed his nose with his thumb only, a quarter of a century
since.

Dunscomb bore this infliction philosophically; and well he
might, for there was no remedy. Waiting for Timms to use his
handkerchief, which was produced somewhat tardily for such an
operation, he quietly opened the subject of their interview.

“So the grand jury has actually found a bill for murder and
arson, my nephew writes me,” Dunscomb observed, looking enquiringly
at his companion, as if really anxious for further intelligence.

“Unanimously, they tell me, Mr. Dunscomb,” answered Timms.
“I understand that only one man hesitated, and he was brought
round before they came into court. That piece of money damns
our case in old Duke's.”

“Money saves more cases than it damns, Timms; and no one
knows it better than yourself.”

“Very true, sir. Money may defy even the new code. Give
me five hundred dollars, and change the proceedings to a civil
action, and I'll carry anything in my own county that you'll put
on the calendar, barring some twenty or thirty jurors I could
name. There are about thirty men in the county that I can do
nothing with — for that matter, whom I dare not approach.”

“How the deuce is it, Timms, that you manage your causes
with so much success? for I remember you have given me a good
deal of trouble in suits in which law and fact were both clearly
enough on my side.”

“I suppose those must have been causes in which we `horse-shedded'
and `pillowed' a good deal.”

“Horse-shedded and pillowed! Those are legal terms of which
I have no knowledge!”

“They are country phrases, sir, and country customs too, for
that matter. A man might practise a long life in town, and know
nothing about them. The Halls of Justice are not immaculate;
but they can tell us nothing of horse-shedding and pillowing.
They do business in a way of which we in the country are just
as ignorant as you are of our mode.”

“Have the goodness, Timms, just to explain the meaning of
your terms, which are quite new to me. I will not swear they
are not in the Code of Practice, but they are in neither Black-stone
nor Kent.”

“Horse-shedding, 'Squire Dunscomb, explains itself. In the
country, most of the jurors, witnesses, &c., have more or less to
do with the horse-sheds, if it's only to see that their beasts are
fed. Well, we keep proper talkers there, and it must be a knotty
case, indeed, into which an ingenious hand cannot thrust a doubt
or an argument. To be frank with you, I've known three pretty
difficult suits summed up under a horse-shed in one day; and
twice as many opened.”

“But how is this done? — do you present your arguments
directly, as in court?”

“Lord bless you, no. In court, unless the jury happen to be
unusually excellent, counsel have to pay some little regard to the
testimony and the law; but, in horse-shedding, one has no need
of either. A skilful horse-shedder, for instance, will talk a party
to pieces, and not say a word about the case. That's the perfection
of the business. It's against the law, you know, Mr. Dunscomb,
to talk of a case before a juror — an indictable offence —
but one may make a case of a party's general character, of his
means, his miserly qualities, or his aristocracy; and it will be
hard to get hold of the talker for any of them qualities. Aristocracy,
of late years, is a capital argument, and will suit almost

any state of facts, or any action you can bring. Only persuade
the jury that the plaintiff or defendant fancies himself better than
they are, and the verdict is certain. I got a thousand dollars in
the Springer case, solely on that ground. Aristocracy did it! It
is going to do us a great deal of harm in this murder and arson
indictment.”

“But Mary Monson is no aristocrat — she is a stranger, and
unknown. What privileges does she enjoy, to render her obnoxious
to the charge of aristocracy?”

“More than will do her any good. Her aristocracy does her
almost as much harm in old Duke's as the piece of gold. I
always consider a cause as half lost, when there is any aristocracy
in it.”

“Aristocracy means exclusive political privileges in the hands
of a few; and it means nothing else. Now, what exclusive political
privileges does this unfortunate young woman enjoy? She
is accused of two of the highest crimes known to the laws; is
indicted, imprisoned, and will be tried.”

“Yes, and by her peers,” said Timms, taking out a very respectable-looking
box, and helping himself liberally to a pinch
of cut tobacco. “It's wonderful, 'Squire Dunscomb, how much
breadth the peerage possesses in this country! I saw a trial, a
year or two since, in which one of the highest intellects of the
land was one of the parties, and in which a juror asked the judge
to explain the meaning of the word `bereaved.' That citizen
had his rights referred to his peers, with a vengeance!”

“Yes; the venerable maxim of the common law is, occasionally,
a little caricatured among us. This is owing to our adhering
to antiquated opinions after the facts in which they had their
origin have ceased to exist. But, by your manner of treating
the subject, Timms, I infer that you give up the aristocracy.”

“Not at all. Our client will have more risks to run on account
of that, than on account of any other weak spot in her

case. I think we might get along with the piece of gold, as a
life is in question; but it is not quite so easy to see how we are
to get along with the aristocracy.”

“And this in the face of her imprisonment, solitary condition,
friendless state, and utter dependence on strangers for her future
fate? I see no one feature of aristocracy to reproach her
with.”

“But I see a great many, and so does the neighbourhood. It
is already getting to be the talk of half the county. In short,
all are talking about it, but they who know better. You'll see,
'Squire Dunscomb, there are two sorts of aristocracy in the eyes
of most people; your sort, and my sort. Your sort is a state of
society that gives privileges and power to a few, and keeps it
there. That is what I call old-fashioned aristocracy, about which
nobody cares anything in this country. We have no such aristocrats,
I allow, and consequently they don't signify a straw.”

“Yet they are the only true aristocrats, after all. But what,
or who are yours.”

“Well now, 'Squire, you are a sort of aristocrat yourself, in a
certain way. I don't know how it is—I'm admitted to the bar
as well as you — have just as many rights—”

“More, Timms, if leading jurors by the nose, and horse-shedding,
can be accounted rights.”

“Well, more, in some respects, may be. Notwithstanding all
this, there is a difference between us — a difference in our ways,
in our language, in our ideas, our manner of thinking and acting,
that sets you up above me in a way I should not like in any other
man. As you did so much for me when a boy, sir, and carried
me through to the bar on your shoulders, as it might be, I shall
always look up to you; though I must say that I do not always
like even your superiority.”

“I should be sorry, Timms, if I ever so far forget my own
great defects, as to parade unfeelingly any little advantages I

may happen to possess over you, or over any other man, in consequence
of the accidents of birth and education.”

“You do not parade them unfeelingly, sir; you do not parade
them at all. Still, they will show themselves; and they are just
the things I do not like to look at. Now, what is true of me, is
true of all my neighbours. We call anything aristocracy that is
a touch above us, let it be what it may. I sometimes think
'Squire Dunscomb is a sort of an aristocrat in the law! Now, as
for our client, she has a hundred ways with her that are not the
ways of Duke's, unless you go among the tip-toppers.”

“The Upper Ten—”

“Pshaw! I know better than that myself, 'Squire. Their
Upper Ten should be upper one, or two, to be common sense.
Rude and untaught as I was until you took me by the hand, sir,
I can tell the difference between those who wear kids, and ride in
their coaches, and those who are fit for either. Our client has
none of this, sir; and that it is which surprises me. She has no
Union Place, or Fifth Avenue, about her; but is the true coin.
There is one thing in particular that I'm afraid may do her
harm.”

“It is the true coin which usually passes with the least trouble
from hand to hand. But what is this particular source of uneasiness?”

“Why, the client has a lady-friend—”

A little exclamation from Dunscomb caused the speaker to
pause, while the counsellor removed the segar from his mouth,
knocked off its ashes, and appeared to ponder for a moment,
touching the best manner of treating a somewhat delicate subject.
At length, native frankness overcame all scruples, and he spoke
plainly, or as the familiar instructor might be expected to address
a very green pupil.

“If you love me, Timms, never repeat that diabolical phrase
again,” said Dunscomb, looking quite serious, however much

there might have been of affectation in his aspect. “It is even
worse than Hurlgate, which I have told you fifty times I cannot
endure. `Lady friend' is infernally vulgar, and I will not stand
it. You may blow your nose with your fingers, if it give you
especial satisfaction, and you may blow out against aristocracy as
much as you please; but you shall not talk to me about `ladyfriends'
or `Hurlgate.' I am no dandy, but a respectable elderly
gentleman, who professes to speak English, and who wishes to be
addressed in his own language. Heaven knows what the country
is coming to! There is Webster, to begin with, cramming a
Yankee dialect down our throats for good English; then comes
all the cant of the day, flourishing finical phrases, and new significations
to good old homely words, and changing the very nature
of mankind by means of terms. Last of all, is this infernal Code,
in which the ideas are as bad as possible, and the terms still worse.
But whom do you mean by your `lady-friend?”'

“The French lady that has been with our client, now, for a
fortnight. Depend on it, she will do us no good when we are on.
She is too aristocratic altogether.”

Dunscomb laughed outright. Then he passed a hand across
his brow, and seemed to muse.

“All this is very serious,” he at length replied, “and is really
no laughing matter. A pretty pass are we coming to, if the
administration of the law is to be influenced by such things as
these! The doctrine is openly held that the rich shall not, ought
not to embellish their amusements at a cost that the poor cannot
compass; and here we have a member of the bar telling us a
prisoner shall not have justice because she has a foreign maidservant!”

“A servant! Call her anything but that, 'Squire, if you wish
for success! A prisoner accused of capital crimes, with a servant,
would be certain to be condemned. Even the court would hardly
stand that.”

“Timms, you are a shrewd, sagacious fellow, and are apt to
laugh in your sleeve at follies of this nature, as I well know from
long acquaintance; and here you insist on one of the greatest of
all the absurdities.”

“Things are changed in Ameriky, Mr. Dunscomb. The people
are beginning to govern; and when they can't do it legally, they
do it without law. Don't you see what the papers say about
having operas and play-houses at the people's prices, and the
right to hiss? There's Constitution for you! I wonder what
Kent and Blackstone would say to that?”

“Sure enough. They would find some novel features in a
liberty which says a man shall not set the price on the seats in
his own theatre, and that the hissing may be done by an audience
in the streets. The facts are, Timms, that all these abuses about
O. P.'s, and controlling other persons' concerns under the pretence
that the public has rights where, as a public, it has no
rights at all, come from the reaction of a half-way liberty in other
countries. Here, where the people are really free, having all the
power, and where no political right is hereditary, the people
ought, at least, to respect their own ordinances.”

“Do you not consider a theatre a public place, 'Squire Dunscomb?”

“In one sense it is, certainly; but not in the sense that bears
on this pretended power over it. The very circumstance that
the audience pay for their seats, makes it, in law as in fact, a
matter of covenant. As for this newfangled absurdity about its
being a duty to furnish low-priced seats for the poor, where they
may sit and look at pretty women because they cannot see them
elsewhere, it is scarcely worth an argument. If the rich should
demand that the wives and daughters of the poor should be
paraded in the pits and galleries, for their patrician eyes to feast
on, a pretty clamour there would be! If the state requires cheap
theatres, and cheap women, let the state pay for them, as it does

for its other wants; but, if these amusements are to be the object
of private speculations, let private wisdom control them. I have
no respect for one-sided liberty, let it cant as much as it may.”

“Well, I don't know, sir; I have read some of these articles,
and they seemed to me—”

“What — convincing?”

“Perhaps not just that, 'Squire; but very agreeable. I'm
not rich enough to pay for a high place at an opera or a theatre;
and it is pleasant to fancy that a poor feller can get one of the
best seats at half-price. Now, in England, they tell me, the
public won't stand prices they don't like.”

“Individuals of the public may refuse to purchase, and there
their rights cease. An opera, in particular, is a very expensive
amusement; and in all countries where the rates of admission
are low, the governments contribute to the expenditures. This
is done from policy, to keep the people quiet, and possibly to
help civilize them; but, if we are not far beyond the necessity of
any such expedients, our institutions are nothing but a sublime
mystification.”

“It is wonderful, 'Squire, how many persons see the loose
side of democracy, who have no notion of the tight! But, all
this time, our client is in gaol at Biberry, and must be tried next
week. Has nothing been done, 'Squire, to choke off the newspapers,
who have something to say about her almost every day.
It's quite time the other side should be heard.”

“It is very extraordinary that the persons who control these
papers should be so indifferent to the rights of others as to allow
such paragraphs to find a place in their columns.”

“Indifferent! What do they care, so long as the journal sells?
In our case, however, I rather suspect that a certain reporter has
taken offence; and when men of that class get offended, look out
for news of the colour of their anger. Isn't it wonderful, 'Squire
Dunscomb, that the people don't see and feel that they are sustaining

low tyrants, in two-thirds of their silly clamour about
the liberty of the press?”

“Many do see it; and I think this engine has lost a great
deal of its influence within the last few years. As respects proceedings
in the courts, there never will be any true liberty in the
country, until the newspapers are bound hand and foot.”

“You are right enough in one thing, 'Squire, and that is in
the ground the press has lost. It has pretty much used itself up
in Duke's; and I would pillow and horse-shed a cause through
against it, the best day it ever saw!”

“By the way, Timms, you have not explained the pillowing
process to me.”

“I should think the word itself would do that, sir. You
know how it is in the country. Half a dozen beds are put in the
same room, and two in a bed. Waal, imagine three or four jurors
in one of these rooms, and two chaps along with 'em, with instructions
how to talk. The conversation is the most innocent
and nat'ral in the world; not a word too much or too little; but
it sticks like a bur. The juror is a plain, simple-minded countryman,
and swallows all that his room-mates say, and goes into the
box next day in a beautiful frame of mind to listen to reason and
evidence! No, no; give me two or three of these pillow-counsellors,
and I'll undo all that the journals can do, in a single
conversation. You'll remember, 'Squire, that we get the last
word by this system; and if the first blow is half the battle in
war, the last word is another half in the law. Oh! it's a beautiful
business, is this trial by jury.”

“All this is very wrong, Timms. For a long time I have
known that you have exercised an extraordinary influence over
the jurors of Duke's; but this is the first occasion on which you
have been frank enough to reveal the process.”

“Because this is the first occasion on which we have ever had
a capital case together. In the present state of public opinion

in Duke's, I much question whether we can get a jury empannelled
in this trial at all.”

“The Supreme Court will then send us to town, by way of
mending the matter. Apropos, Timms—”

“One word if you please, 'Squire; what does à propos really
mean? I hear it almost every day, but never yet knew the
meaning.”

“It has shades of difference in its signification—as I just used
it, it means `speaking of that.' ”

“And is it right to say à propos to such a thing?”

“It is better to say à propos of, as the French do. In old
English it was always to; but in our later mode of speaking, we
say `of.' ”

“Thank you, sir. You know how I glean my knowledge in
driblets; and out in the country not always from the highest
authorities. Plain and uncouth as I know I appear to you, and
to Miss Sarah, I have an ambition to be a gentleman. Now, I
have observation enough to see that it is these little matters, after
all, and not riches and fine clothes, that make gentlemen and
ladies.”

“I am glad you have so much discrimination, Timms; but,
you must permit me to remark, that you will never make a gentleman
until you learn to let your nose alone.”

“Thank you, sir — I am thankful for even the smallest hints
on manners. It's a pity that so handsome and so agreeable a
young lady should be hanged, Mr. Dunscomb!”

“Timms, you are as shrewd a fellow, in your own way, as I
know. Your law does not amount to any great matter, nor do
you take hold of the strong points of a case very often; but you
perform wonders with the weaker. In the way of an opinion on
facts, I know few men more to be relied on. Tell me, then,
frankly, what do you think of the guilt or innocence of Mary
Monson?”

Timms screwed up his mouth, passed a hand over his brow,
and did not answer for near a minute.

“Perhaps it is right, after all, that we should understand each
other on this subject,” he then said. “We are associated as
counsel, and I feel it a great honour to be so associated, 'Squire
Dunscomb, I give you my word; and it is proper that we should
be as free with each other as brothers. In the first place, then,
I never saw such a client before, as this same lady — for lady I
suppose we must call her until she is convicted—”

“Convicted!—You cannot think there is much danger of that,
Timms?”

“We never know, sir; we never know. I have lost cases of
which I was sure, and gained them of which I had no hopes —
cases which I certainly ought not to have gained — ag'in all law
and the facts.”

“Ay, that came of the horse-shed, and the sleeping of two in
a bed.”

“Perhaps it did, 'Squire,” returned Timms, laughing very
freely, though without making any noise; “perhaps it did. When
the small-pox is about, there is no telling who may take it. As
for this case, 'Squire Dunscomb, it is my opinion we shall have
to run for disagreements. If we can get the juries to disagree
once or twice, and can get a change of venue, with a couple of
charges, the deuce is in it if a man of your experience don't
corner them so tightly, they'll give the matter up, rather than
have any more trouble about it. After all, the state can't gain
much by hanging a young woman that nobody knows, even if
she be a little aristocratical. We must get her to change her
dress altogether, and some of her ways too; which, in her circumstances,
I call downright hanging ways; and the sooner she is
rid of them, the better.”

“I see that you do not think us very strong on the merits,
Timms, which is as much as admitting the guilt of our client. I

was a good deal inclined to suspect the worst myself; but two or
three more interviews, and what my nephew Jack Wilmeter tells
me, have produced a change. I am now strongly inclined to
believe her innocent. She has some great and secret cause of
apprehension, I will allow; but I do not think these unfortunate
Goodwins have anything to do with it.”

“Waal, one never knows. The verdict, if `not guilty,' will
be just as good as if she was as innocent as a child a year old.
I see how the work is to be done. All the law, and the summing
up, will fall to your share; while the out-door work will be mine.
We may carry her through — though I'm of opinion that, if we
do, it will be more by means of bottom than by means of foot.
There is one thing that is very essential, sir — the money must
hold out.”

“Do you want a refresher so soon, Timms? — Jack tells
me that she has given you two hundred and fifty dollars
already!”

“I acknowledge it, sir; and a very respectable fee it is — you
ought to have a thousand, 'Squire.”

“I have not received a cent, nor do I mean to touch any of
her money. My feelings are in the case, and I am willing to
work for nothing.”

Timms gave his old master a quick but scrutinizing glance.
Dunscomb was youthful, in all respects, for his time of life; and
many a man has loved, and married, and become the parent of a
flourishing family, who had seen all the days he had seen. That
glance was to inquire if it were possible that the uncle and nephew
were likely to be rivals, and to obtain as much knowledge
as could be readily gleaned in a quick, jealous look. But the
counsellor was calm as usual, and no tinge of colour, no sigh, no
gentleness of expression, betrayed the existence of the master
passion. It was reported among the bachelor's intimates that
formerly, when he was about five-and-twenty, he had had an

affair of the heart, which had taken such deep hold that even
the lady's marriage with another man had not destroyed its impression.
That marriage was said not to have been happy, and
was succeeded by a second, that was still less so; though the
parties were affluent, educated, and possessed all the means that
are commonly supposed to produce felicity. A single child was
the issue of the first marriage, and its birth had shortly preceded
the separation that followed. Three years later the father died,
leaving the whole of a very ample fortune to this child, coupled
with the strange request that Dunscomb, once the betrothed of
her mother, should be the trustee and guardian of the daughter.
This extraordinary demand had not been complied with, and
Dunscomb had not seen any of the parties from the time he
broke with his mistress. The heiress married young, died within
the year, and left another heiress; but no further allusion to our
counsellor was made, in any of the later wills and settlements.
Once, indeed, he had been professionally consulted concerning
the devises in favour of the granddaughter — a certain Mildred
Millington — who was a second-cousin to Michael of that name,
and as rich as he was poor. For some years, a sort of vague
expectation prevailed that these two young Millingtons might
marry; but a feud existed in the family, and little or no intercourse
was permitted. The early removal of the young lady to
a distant school prevented such a result; and Michael, in due
time, fell within the influence of Sarah Wilmeter's gentleness,
beauty, and affection.

Timms came to the conclusion that his old master was not in
love.

“It is very convenient to be rich, 'Squire,” this singular being
remarked; “and I dare say it may be very pleasant to practise
for nothing, when a man has his pocket full of money. I am
poor, and have particular satisfaction in a good warm fee. By
the way, sir, my part of the business requires plenty of money.

I do not think I can even commence operations with less than
five hundred dollars.”

Dunscomb leaned back, stretched forth an arm, drew his
cheque-book from its niche, and filled a cheque for the sum just
mentioned. This he quietly handed to Timms, without asking
for any receipt; for, while he knew that his old student and
fellow-practitioner was no more to be trusted in matters of practice
than was an eel in the hand, he knew that he was scrupulously
honest in matters of account. There was not a man in
the state to whom Dunscomb would sooner confide the care of
uncounted gold, or the administration of an estate, or the payment
of a legacy, than this very individual; who, he also well
knew, would not scruple to set all the provisions of the law at
naught, in order to obtain a verdict, when his feelings were really
in the case.

“There, Timms,” said the senior counsel, glancing at his
draft before he handed it to the other, in order to see that it was
correct; “there is what you ask for. Five hundred for expenses,
and half as much as a fee.”

“Thank you, sir. I hope this is not gratuitous, as well as the
services?”

“It is not. There is no want of funds, and I am put in possession
of sufficient money to carry us through with credit; but
it is as a trustee, and not as a fee. This, indeed, is the most
extraordinary part of the whole affair; — to find a delicate, educated,
accomplished lady, with her pockets well lined, in such a
situation!”

“Why, 'Squire,” said Timms, passing his hand down his
chin, and trying to look simple and disinterested, “I am afraid
clients like ours are often flush. I have been employed about
the Tombs a good deal in my time, and I have gin'rally found
that the richest clients were the biggest rogues.”

Dunscomb gave his companion a long and contemplative look.
He saw that Timms did not entertain quite as favourable an
opinion of Mary Monson as he did himself, or rather that he was
fast getting to entertain; for his own distrust originally was
scarcely less than that of this hackneyed dealer with human vices.
A long, close, and stringent examination of all of Timms's facts
succeeded — facts that had been gleaned by collecting statements
on the spot. Then a consultation followed, from which it might
be a little premature, just now, to raise the veil.