Benjamin Carr had a great mind to tell his father, that even if it were threatened and taken, he was as well off now as he had been a short while before. But it was not a time to press matters, and he drove the squire to the station in silence. On that busy Saturday morning--and Saturdays were always busy days at the office of Mr. Fauntleroy--the clerks were amazed by the disturbed entrance of Squire Carr, pushing, agitated, restless; far more amazed than was perhaps their master, Mr. Fauntleroy. He had half expected it. There ensued a hasty explanation; but the squire scarcely allowed himself to listen to it. Of all the blows that could have come upon him, this was the worst. "And what do you think of yourself, pray, to be taking up a cause against the Carr family, when you have stuck by it for half a century, or it by you?" "By old Marmaduke; by no others of it," returned Mr. Fauntleroy, who was secretly enjoying the squire's perplexity beyond everything. "Why do you turn round against him now? I did not expect it of you, Fauntleroy." "I don't understand you, squire." "You are turning against the money he left, which is the same thing, wanting to make ducks and drakes of it." "Marmaduke Curr's grandson came here and asked me if I would act for him as his solicitor, and I assented," said Mr. Fauntleroy. "In entering this action against you, I am but obeying his instructions." "Marmaduke Carr's grandson!" scoffed the squire. "Who is he, the ill-born cur"--not but that the squire's words were somewhat plainer--"that he should presume to set himself up in his false pretences?" "Ill-born or well-born, my clients are the same to me, provided their cause is good, and they pay me," coolly rejoined Mr. Fauntleroy. "Well, is it a hoax?" asked the squire, coming nearer to the point, for Mr. Fauntleroy was taking a stealthy glance at his watch. "If you mean is the action a hoax, most certainly it is not. Robert Carr looks upon it that he has the best right to his grandfather's money, and----" "Why do you call him Robert _Carr_?" interposed the squire, in a flash of anger. "What else can I call him? I wish you'd be a little cooler, and let me finish. And he has given me instructions to spare no pains, no expense, in maintaining this action against you." "Is he a fool?" asked the squire. "It's one of two things: either he is a fool--for he must know that such an action can't be sustained under present circumstances, and so must you--or else he has got some secret information that I am in ignorance of. _Has_ he got it? Is there a will of Marmaduke's found?" "Of course there's not," said Mr. Fauntleroy, taken by surprise; "I should have heard of it, if there had been. As to any other information, I can't say; I don't know of any." "Look here, Fauntleroy: if there is to be an action--not that I should think the fellow will be mad enough to go on with it--will you act for me?" "I can't," said Mr. Fauntleroy; "I am acting for him."