“I suppose, now, Mr. Rock,” said Mrs. Gillingwater, pointing to the grinning gurgoyles, “that you don’t find it lonesome up here at nights, with those stone parties for company?” “Not a bit of it, Mrs. Gillingwater; why, I’ve known them all ever since I was a child, as doubtless others have before me, and they are downright good friends to me, they are. I have names for every one of them, and I talk to them sometimes too—now this and now that, as the fancy takes me.” “Just what I should have expected of you, Mr. Rock,” answered Mrs. Gillingwater significantly; “not but what I dare say it is good training.” “Meaning?” said Samuel. “Meaning, Mr. Rock, that as it is getting late, and it’s a long and windy walk home, we’d better stop talking of stone figures and come to business—that is, if you have a mind for it.” “By all means, Mrs. Gillingwater. But what is the business?” “Well, it’s this: last time we met, when we parted in anger, though through no fault of mine, you said that you wanted Joan’s address: and now I’ve got it.” “You’ve got it? Then tell it me. Come, be quick!” and he leaned towards her across the polished oak table. “No, no, Mr. Rock: do you think that I am as green as an alder shoot, that you should ask such a thing of me? I must have the money before you get the address. Do you understand?” “I understand, Mrs. Gillingwater; but be reasonable. How can you expect me to pay you five-and-twenty pounds for what may be gammon after all?” “Five-and-twenty pounds, Mr. Rock! No such thing, indeed: it is fifty pounds I want, every farthing of it, or you get nothing out of me.” “Fifty pounds!” answered Samuel; “then I don’t think that we need talk no longer, Mrs. Gillingwater, seeing that I ain’t going to give you fifty pounds, no, not for the address of all the angels in heaven.” “I dare say not, Mr. Rock: _they’d_ be precious little use to you when you’d got them, either now or at any future time, to judge from what I knows of you”—and she glanced significantly at the sculptured demons beneath the ceiling—“but you see Joan’s whereabouts is another matter, more especially since she isn’t an angel yet, though she’s been nigh enough to it, poor dear.” “What do you mean by that, ma’am? Is she ill, then?” “When I’ve got the fifty pounds in my pocket, Mr. Rock, I’ll be glad enough to tell you all about it, but till then my mouth is sealed. Indeed, it’s a great risk that I run letting you know at all, for if the old man yonder finds it out, I think that he’ll be the ruin of me. And now, will you pay, or won’t you?” “I won’t give you the fifty pounds,” he answered, setting his teeth; “I’ll give you thirty, and that’s the last farthing which you’ll screw out of me—and a lot of money too, seeing that there’s no reason why I should pay you anything at all.”