iracy! Quit shaking,
you wretched coward! Stand up and fight this infernal libel like a man.
Ain't there two of us? If this wicked charge is brought against James
Knock Jervoyce, ain't it brought as well against Jack Jervase, his
cousin and his partner? Look at me! You don't see me shivering and
shaking like a frightened rabbit with a weasel after him.'

'Ah! 'cried James, in a weak exasperation, 'it all very well for you.
It might mean loss of money to you at the worst; but I'm the man they're
going for.'

'Oh,' said John, 'you are, are you? And why's that?'

'Stubbs told me this afternoon,' said James, c that he could smash me
dead, but so far he has no particle of evidence against you.'

A light sprang into the burly scoundrel's eyes. He veiled it in an
instant, but not before two of the quartette there present had read it.
The boy turned away, groaning, and the General looked after him with a
face from which all sternness disappeared for a moment.

'Poor lad! 'he said, within doors. 'Poor lad!'

'Now, look here,' said John Jervase, 'they haven't got any evidence agen
you any more than they have agen me. The whole thing's a put-up job. If
it was De Blacquaire's doing, he'd have gone for me rather than for
you, because he always hated me, and I've put him down more than once
or twice at Petty Sessions, and taught him to know his place. But De
Blacquaire's an officer and a gentleman'--he made a burly bow towards
the General--' and I don't suppose for a minute that he'd be guilty even
of dreaming of such a piece of rascality as this. It's much more likely
to be some pettifogging lawyer's game--some sneaking rogue that's got
these fellow-rascals round him, with an idea of doing a little bit of
blackmail. Stubbs is a decent fellow--for a lawyer. I don't think Stubbs
would have a finger in that sort of pie, any more than his master. But
Stubbs has been got at; that's how it'll turn out, you bet. Keep your
pecker up, James,' he added, in a tone which the patron and the bully
spoke at once. 'Well take care of you. Just you trust to old Jack
Jervase--that's your game, my lad. He'll fight the battle for the pair
of us.'

Between his pretence of having thought the matter out impartially, and
his other pretence of encouraging his timid relative, he had talked
himself back into something like his common aspect, and his common
manner; and there was a little of the nautical swagger in the few
steps he took towards the table