"It may well do so, Mr. Quirk. Now we _are_ fairly embarked in a cause where success will be attended with so many splendid results, Mr. Quirk--though I'm sure you'll always bear me out in saying how very unwilling I was to take advantage of the villany of that miscreant Steg--hem"---- "Gammon, Gammon, you're always harking back to that--I'm tired of hearing on't!" interrupted Quirk, angrily, but with an embarrassed air. "Well, now we're in it," said Gammon, with a sigh, and shrugging his shoulders, "I don't see why we should allow ourselves to be baffled by trifles. The plain question is, undoubtedly, whether we are to stand still--_or go on_." Mr. Quirk gazed at Mr. Gammon with an anxious and puzzled look. "How d'ye make out--in a legal way, you know, Gammon--_when_ a man died--I mean, of a _natural_ death?" somewhat mysteriously inquired Quirk, who was familiar enough with the means of proving the exact hour of certain _violent_ deaths at Debtor's Door. "Oh! there are various methods of doing so, my dear sir," replied Gammon, carelessly. "Entries in family Bibles and prayer-books--registers--tombstones--ay, by the way, AN OLD TOMBSTONE," continued Gammon, musingly, "that would settle the business!" "An old tombstone!" echoed Quirk, briskly, but suddenly dropping his voice. "Lord, Gammon, so it would! That's an _idea_!--I call that a decided idea, Gammon. 'Twould be the very thing!" "The very thing!" repeated Gammon, pointedly. They remained silent for some moments. "Snap could not have looked about him sharply enough when he was down at Yatton--could he, Gammon?" at length observed Quirk, in a low tone, flushing all over as he uttered the last words, and felt Gammon's cold gray eye settled on him like that of a snake. "He could not, indeed, my dear sir," replied Gammon, while Quirk continued gazing earnestly at him, now and then wriggling about in his chair, rubbing his chin, and drumming with his fingers on the table.--"And now that you've suggested the thing, [oh, Gammon! Gammon]--it's not to be wondered at!--You know, it would have been an old tombstone--a sort of fragment of a tombstone, perhaps--so deeply sunk in the ground, probably, as easily to have escaped observation. Eh?--Does not it strike _you_ so, Mr. Quirk?" All this was said by Gammon in a musing manner, and in a very low tone of voice; and he was delighted to find his words sinking into the eager and fertile mind of his companion. "Ah, Gammon!" exclaimed Quirk, with a sound of partly a sigh, and partly a whistle, (the former being the exponent of the _true_ state of his feelings, _i. e._ anxiety--the latter of what he wished to _appear_ the state of his feelings, _i. e._ indifference.) "Yes, Mr. Quirk?" "You're a deep devil, Gammon--I _will_ say that for you!" replied Quirk, glancing towards each door, and, as it were, unconsciously drawing his chair a little closer to that of Gammon.