uish hundreds
of pounds.

'Look here, Riah,' said Fledgeby, mollified by these self-approving
considerations. 'I want to go a little more into buying-up queer bills.
Look out in that direction.'

'Sir, it shall be done.'

'Casting my eye over the accounts, I find that branch of business pays
pretty fairly, and I am game for extending it. I like to know people's
affairs likewise. So look out.'

'Sir, I will, promptly.'

'Put it about in the right quarters, that you'll buy queer bills by the
lump--by the pound weight if that's all--supposing you see your way to a
fair chance on looking over the parcel. And there's one thing more. Come
to me with the books for periodical inspection as usual, at eight on
Monday morning.'

Riah drew some folding tablets from his breast and noted it down.

'That's all I wanted to say at the present time,' continued Fledgeby in
a grudging vein, as he got off the stool, 'except that I wish you'd take
the air where you can hear the bell, or the knocker, either one of the
two or both. By-the-by how DO you take the air at the top of the house?
Do you stick your head out of a chimney-pot?'

'Sir, there are leads there, and I have made a little garden there.'

'To bury your money in, you old dodger?'

'A thumbnail's space of garden would hold the treasure I bury, master,'
said Riah. 'Twelve shillings a week, even when they are an old man's
wages, bury themselves.'

'I should like to know what you really are worth,' returned Fledgeby,
with whom his growing rich on that stipend and gratitude was a very
convenient fiction. 'But come! Let's have a look at your garden on the
tiles, before I go!'

The old man took a step back, and hesitated.

'Truly, sir, I have company there.'

'Have you, by George!' said Fledgeby; 'I suppose you happen to know
whose premises these are?'

'Sir, they are yours, and I am your servant in them.'

'Oh! I thought you might have overlooked that,' retorted Fledgeby, with
his eyes on Riah's beard as he felt for his own; 'having company on my
premises, you know!'

'Come up and see the guests, sir. I hope for your admission that they
can do no harm.'

Passing him with a courteous reverence, specially unlike any action that
Mr Fledgeby could for his life have imparted to his own head and hands,
the old man began to ascend the stairs. As he toiled on before, with his
palm upon the stair-rail, and his long black skirt, a very gaberdine,
overhanging each succes