"No, I have not a chance--not a chance!" at length he thought to himself--"That girl will be prouder in her poverty, than ever she would have been in her wealth and splendor. Who am I?--a partner in the firm of Quirk, Gammon, and Snap; a firm in bad odor with the profession; looking for practice from polluted sources, with a host of miscreants for clients--faugh! faugh! I feel contaminated and degraded! My name even is against me; it is growing into a by-word!--We must push our advantage--they must be driven from Yatton--he, she--all of them; yes, all." He paused for a long time, and a sort of pang passed through his mind. "They are to make way for--Titmouse!--for Titmouse!! And he, too, loves her--_bah!_" He involuntarily uttered this sound fiercely, and aloud. "But stay--he really is in love with Miss Aubrey--that I know;--ah! I can turn it to good purpose; it will give me, by the way, a hold upon the little fool; I will make him believe that through my means he may obtain Miss Aubrey! Misery may make her accessible; I can easily bring myself into contact with them, in their distress; for there are the mesne profits--_the mesne profits!_ Heavens! how glorious, but how dreadful an engine are _they_! They will help to batter down the high wall of pride that surrounds _them_ and _her_; but it will require infinite care and tact in the use of such an engine! I will be all delicacy--gentleness--generosity; I will appear friendly to her, and to her brother; and, if needs must be, why he must be _crushed_. There is no help for it. He looks decidedly, by the way--a man of intellect. I wonder how he bears it--how they all bear it--how _she_ bears it! _Beggared beauty_--there's something touching in the very sound! How little they think of the power that is at this moment in my hands!" Here a long interval elapsed, during which his thoughts had wandered towards more practical matters. "If they don't get a rule _nisi_, next term, we shall be in a position to ask them what course they intend to pursue: Gad, they may, if so disposed, hold out for--how very cold it is!"--he buttoned his coat--"and, what have I been thinking of? Really I have been dreaming; or am I as great a fool as Tittlebat?" Within a few minutes' time he had quitted the walls, and descended through one of the turreted gateways, into the town. CHAPTER II.