“Then, sir, twenty be it: if in a weak moment I agreed. Hearty Wibraham would rather throw up all his connexion than allow any man to say of him, sir, that he had departed from his word.” His voice trembled slightly, and there was a twinkle as of tears in his eyes. Crad began to apologize, though he could not quite see what harm he had done. “Dash it, my boy, not another word. We understand each other. There is your receipt.” In his confidence, Hearty Wibraham passed the receipt form, now filled up, to the aspiring coal–merchant, without having seen so much as the colour of his money. Then Cradock pulled out Amyʼs purse, in which he had put the cash, for good luck, and paid his footing bravely. “Sir, I will not thank you,” said Mr. Wibraham, as he took the money, “because the act would not be genuine. And I am proudly able to declare that I have never yet done anything, even for the sake of the common courtesies of life, which has not been thoroughly genuine. My boy, this paltry twenty guineas is the opening of your mercantile life. May that life be prosperous; as I am sure you deserve.” Cradock took another glass of Madeira, as genuine as its owner, and, after a hearty farewell, felt so rapidly on the rise, so touched, for the first time of many weeks, by the dexter wand of fortune, that he bought a quarter of an ounce of birdʼs–eye with an infusion of “Latakia” (grown in the footpath field at Mitcham), and actually warmed his dear brotherʼs pipe, which had not once been incremated ever since the sacred fire of the Prytaneum had languished. Wena was overjoyed to see him, and she loved the smell of tobacco, and had often come sniffing about on the hearth–rug (or the bit of baize that did for it) to know whether it was true that a big man—a mastiff of a man, they told her—had succeeded in abolishing it; now, seeing the blue curls quivering nicely, she jumped upon his lap; and, although she was rather heavy, he thought it would be practice towards the nursing of Amy, and possibly Amyʼs children. Then, when he thought of that, he grew more happy than fifty emperors. Fortune may jump on a young fellowʼs heart, with both heels set together; but, the moment she takes one off, up it comes, like a bladder too big to go into the football. On Monday morning at ten oʼclock, our Crad, in a state of large excitement, appeared before the gorgeous plate, and rang the bell thereover. It was answered by an office–boy, with a grin so intensely humorous that it was worth all the guineas that could have been thrust into the great mouth he exhibited. “Mr. Newman?” asked the boy, with a patronizing air, which a little mind would have found offensive. “To be sure,” replied Cradock; “I suppose I am expected.” “That you are,” said the cheeky boy, grinning harder than ever; “the other three gents is waiting, sir. Get you a penny paper for three half–pence.”