ded.

"Who said anything of my letting my house to the Tory party, Mr
Scruby? I'm as round as your hat, Mr Scruby, and as square as your
elbow; I am. But suppose as all the liberal gents as employs you,
Mr Scruby, was to turn again you and not pay you your little bills,
wouldn't you have your eyes open for customers of another kind? Come
now, Mr Scruby?"

"You won't make much of that game, Grimes."

"Perhaps not; perhaps not. There's a risk in all these things; isn't
there, Mr Vavasor? I should like to see you a Parliament gent; I
should indeed. You'd be a credit to the districts; I really think you
would."

"I'm much obliged by your good opinion, Mr Grimes," said George.

"When I sees a gent coming forward I knows whether he's fit for
Parliament, or whether he ain't. I says you are fit. But Lord love
you, Mr Vavasor; it's a thing a gentleman always has to pay for."

"That's true enough; a deal more than it's worth, generally."

"A thing's worth what it fetches. I'm worth what I'll fetch; that's
the long and the short of it. I want to have my balance, that's the
truth. It's the odd money in a man's bill as always carries the
profit. You ask Mr Scruby else;--only with a lawyer it's all profit I
believe."

"That's what you know about it," said Scruby.

"If you cut off a man's odd money," continued the publican, "you
break his heart. He'd almost sooner have that and leave the other
standing. He'd call the hundreds capital, and if he lost them at
last, why he'd put it down as being in the way of trade. But the odd
money;--he looks at that, Mr Vavasor, as in a manner the very sweat
of his brow, the work of his own hand; that's what goes to his
family, and keeps the pot a boiling down-stairs. Never stop a man's
odd money, Mr Vavasor; that is, unless he comes it very strong
indeed."

"And what is it you want now?" said Scruby.

"I wants ninety-two pounds thirteen and fourpence, Mr Scruby, and
then we'll go to work for the new fight with contented hearts. If
we're to begin at all, it's quite time; it is indeed, Mr Vavasor."

"And what you mean us to understand is, that you won't begin at all
without your money," said the lawyer.

"That's about it, Mr Scruby."

"Take a fifty-pound note, Grimes," said the lawyer.

"Fifty-pound notes are not so ready," said George.

"Oh, he'll be only too happy to have your acceptance; won't you,
Grimes."

"Not for fifty pounds, Mr Scruby. It's the odd money that I wants.
I