“There is nothing shameful in the story?” “Fie, sir, fie! Is this your tender concern for my old and honoured friend and patron? Be there shame, ’tis none of his.” “Possibly of mine, you would say. Mr. Creel, I have grown very humble of late months.” “Save us, save us!--Yet, I would not quench, but only control that fervid spirit. Go to! you shall have the history word for word as your father wrote it; and as such left it to my full discretion to acquaint you of or not. No doubt you have suffered and learnt since we last met, and are now in a state to appreciate the moral no less than the material value of your inheritance.” He rose as he spoke, sparse and bent-backed and bowelless--like the figure 9, symbolic of the nine points of the law. The other watched him with some amusement and a good deal of impatience, as he shuffled to a now familiar deed-box, unlocked it, and took thence a bundle of papers. These he brought to the table, sat himself down again, and selected two from the heap, as dryly deliberate as a monkey turning over a biscuit. Presently he looked up, document in hand. “This,” he said, “the full and true account of the late Sir Robert’s presentation to the property of ‘Delsrop,’ in the county of Hants, was writ down by him in this my office, and read over to me, and by me attested for its truth, inasmuch as I was nominated to act for both parties in the disposition of the estate. Albeit, Mr. Tuke, you must understand the testator was known to me hitherto but by report, the which would hardly have induced me to do his service but for the direction of his bequest--and that, without doubt, was his object in applying to me.” “With favour, sir,” said Mr. Creel’s client; “and with all deference to the discriminatory acumen of the profession--might not this preface serve better as an epilogue?” The attorney winced in his breath, looked over his spectacles which he had been slowly adjusting, and broke suddenly into a leathery smile. “Sir,” said he, “the law stands so much in dead men’s shoes that, perhaps, itself hath lost the sensation to be ‘quick.’ But here’s for you, without more ado.” And so he began his reading:-- “_Re_ the Estate of ‘Delsrop’ and in the matter of Sir Robert Linne, Bart.