that something wrong had been done,--that some
great fraud had been committed; and in connection with this it was
ascertained,--by some as a matter of certainty,--that the Pickering
estate had been already mortgaged by Melmotte to its full value at
an assurance office. In such a transaction there would be nothing
dishonest; but as this place had been bought for the great man's own
family use, and not as a speculation, even this report of the mortgage
tended to injure his credit. And then, as the day went on, other
tidings were told as to other properties. Houses in the East-end of
London were said to have been bought and sold, without payment of the
purchase money as to the buying, and with receipt of the purchase
money as to the selling.

It was certainly true that Squercum himself had seen the letter in Mr
Bideawhile's office which conveyed to the father's lawyer the son's
sanction for the surrender of the title-deeds, and that that letter,
prepared in Mr Bideawhile's office, purported to have Dolly's
signature. Squercum said but little, remembering that his client was
not always clear in the morning as to anything he had done on the
preceding evening. But the signature, though it was scrawled as Dolly
always scrawled it, was not like the scrawl of a drunken man.

The letter was said to have been sent to Mr Bideawhile's office with
other letters and papers, direct from old Mr Longestaffe. Such was the
statement made at first to Mr Squercum by the Bideawhile party, who at
that moment had no doubt of the genuineness of the letter or of the
accuracy of their statement. Then Squercum saw his client again, and
returned to the charge at Bideawhile's office, with the positive
assurance that the signature was a forgery. Dolly, when questioned by
Squercum, quite admitted his propensity to be 'tight'. He had no
reticence, no feeling of disgrace on such matters. But he had signed
no letter when he was tight. 'Never did such a thing in my life, and
nothing could make me,' said Dolly. 'I'm never tight except at the
club, and the letter couldn't have been there. I'll be drawn and
quartered if I ever signed it. That's flat.' Dolly was intent on going
to his father at once, on going to Melmotte at once, on going to
Bideawhile's at once, and making there 'no end of a row,'--but
Squercum stopped him. 'We'll just ferret this thing out quietly,'
said Squercum, who perhaps thought that there would be high honour
in discovering the pecc