ening every one of the
letters that came into the house directed to my wife, and suspecting hers
to everybody. Mary never told me of all this pain for many many years
afterwards; but had always a smiling face for her husband when he came
home from his work. As for poor Gus, my aunt had so frightened him, that
he never once showed his nose in the place all the time we lived there;
but used to be content with news of Mary, of whom he was as fond as he
was of me.

Mr. Brough, when my aunt left him, was in a furious ill-humour with me.
He found fault with me ten times a day, and openly, before the gents of
the office; but I let him one day know pretty smartly that I was not only
a servant, but a considerable shareholder in the company; that I defied
him to find fault with my work or my regularity; and that I was not
minded to receive any insolent language from him or any man. He said it
was always so: that he had never cherished a young man in his bosom, but
the ingrate had turned on him; that he was accustomed to wrong and
undutifulness from his children, and that he would pray that the sin
might be forgiven me. A moment before he had been cursing and swearing
at me, and speaking to me as if I had been his shoeblack. But, look you,
I was not going to put up with any more of Madam Brough's airs, or of
his. With me they might act as they thought fit; but I did not choose
that my wife should be passed over by them, as she had been in the matter
of the visit to Fulham.

Brough ended by warning me of Hodge and Smithers. "Beware of these men,"
said he; "but for my honesty, your aunt's landed property would have been
sacrificed by these cormorants: and when, for her benefit--which you,
obstinate young man, will not perceive--I wished to dispose of her land,
her attorneys actually had the audacity--the unchristian avarice I may
say--to ask ten per cent. commission on the sale."

There might be some truth in this, I thought: at any rate, when rogues
fall out, honest men come by their own: and now I began to suspect, I am
sorry to say, that both the attorney and the Director had a little of the
rogue in their composition. It was especially about my wife's fortune
that Mr. B. showed _his_ cloven foot: for proposing, as usual, that I
should purchase shares with it in our Company, I told him that my wife
was a minor, and as such her little fortune was vested out of my control
altogether. He flung away in a rage at this; and