ful bond--what do you think he
might have hid?'

'It is but a supposition, Mr Wegg.'

'As a Being with his hand upon his heart,' cries Wegg; and the
apostrophe is not the less impressive for the Being's hand being
actually upon his rum and water; 'put your supposition into language,
and bring it out, Mr Venus!'

'He was the species of old gentleman, sir,' slowly returns that
practical anatomist, after drinking, 'that I should judge likely to
take such opportunities as this place offered, of stowing away money,
valuables, maybe papers.'

'As one that was ever an ornament to human life,' says Mr Wegg, again
holding out Mr Venus's palm as if he were going to tell his fortune by
chiromancy, and holding his own up ready for smiting it when the time
should come; 'as one that the poet might have had his eye on, in writing
the national naval words:

Helm a-weather, now lay her close,
Yard arm and yard arm she lies;
Again, cried I, Mr Venus, give her t'other dose,
Man shrouds and grapple, sir, or she flies!

--that is to say, regarded in the light of true British Oak, for such
you are explain, Mr Venus, the expression "papers"!'

'Seeing that the old gentleman was generally cutting off some near
relation, or blocking out some natural affection,' Mr Venus rejoins, 'he
most likely made a good many wills and codicils.'

The palm of Silas Wegg descends with a sounding smack upon the palm
of Venus, and Wegg lavishly exclaims, 'Twin in opinion equally with
feeling! Mix a little more!'

Having now hitched his wooden leg and his chair close in front of Mr
Venus, Mr Wegg rapidly mixes for both, gives his visitor his glass,
touches its rim with the rim of his own, puts his own to his lips, puts
it down, and spreading his hands on his visitor's knees thus addresses
him:

'Mr Venus. It ain't that I object to being passed over for a stranger,
though I regard the stranger as a more than doubtful customer. It ain't
for the sake of making money, though money is ever welcome. It ain't for
myself, though I am not so haughty as to be above doing myself a good
turn. It's for the cause of the right.'

Mr Venus, passively winking his weak eyes both at once, demands: 'What
is, Mr Wegg?'

'The friendly move, sir, that I now propose. You see the move, sir?'

'Till you have pointed it out, Mr Wegg, I can't say whether I do or
not.'

'If there IS anything to be found on these premises, let us find it