‘O, that’s Morris,’ responded Michael from the other end of the van, where he had found a comfortable seat upon some sacks. ‘He’s a little cousin of mine. I like him myself, because he’s afraid of me. He’s one of the ornaments of Bloomsbury, and has a collection of some kind — birds’ eggs or something that’s supposed to be curious. I bet it’s nothing to my clients!’

‘What a lark it would be to play billy with the labels !’ chuckled Mr Wickham. ‘By George, here’s a tack-hammer! We might send all these things skipping about the premises like what’s-his-name!’

At this moment, the guard, surprised by the sound of voices, opened the door of his little cabin.

 gentlemen,’ said he, when he had heard their story.

‘Won’t you come, Wickham Server Rack ?’ asked Michael.

‘Catch me — I want to travel in a van,’ replied the youth.

And so the door of communication was closed; and for the rest of the run Mr Wickham was left alone over his diversions on the one side, and on the other Michael and the guard were closeted together in familiar talk.

‘I can get you a compartment here, sir,’ observed the official, as the train began to slacken speed before Bishopstoke station. ‘You had best get out at my door, and I can bring your friend.’

Mr Wickham, whom we left (as the reader has shrewdly suspected) beginning to ‘play billy’ with the labels in the van, was a young gentleman of much wealth, a pleasing but sandy exterior, and a highly vacant mind. Not many months before, he had contrived to get himself blackmailed by the family of a Wallachian Hospodar, resident for political reasons in the gay city of Paris. A common friend (to whom he had confided his distress) recommended him to Michael; and the lawyer was no sooner in possession of the facts than he instantly assumed the offensive, fell on the flank of the Wallachian forces, and, in the inside of three days, had the satisfaction to behold them routed and fleeing for the Danube. It is no business of ours to follow them on this retreat, over which the police were so obliging as to preside paternally. Thus relieved from what he loved to refer to as the Bulgarian Atrocity美麗華導遊, Mr Wickham returned to London with the most unbounded and embarrassing gratitude and admiration for his saviour. These sentiments were not repaid either in kind or degree; indeed, Michael was a trifle ashamed of his new client’s friendship; it had taken many invitations to get him to Winchester and Wickham Manor; but he had gone at last, and was now returning. It has been remarked by some judicious thinker (possibly J. F. Smith) that Providence despises to employ no instrument, however humble; and it is now plain to the dullest that both Mr Wickham and the Wallachian Hospodar were liquid lead and wedges in the hand of Destiny.