He sat in Eldrick's office one afternoon, winding up his affairs with him. There were certain things that Eldrick & Pascoe would have to do; as for himself it was necessary for him to get back to London. "There's something I want to propose to you," said Eldrick, when they had finished the immediate business. "You're going to practise, of course?" "Of course!" replied Collingwood, with a laugh. "If I get the chance!" "You'll get the chance," said Eldrick. "What were you going in for?" "Commercial law--company law--as a special thing," answered Collingwood. "Why?" "I'll tell you what it is," continued Eldrick eagerly. "There's a career for you if you'll take my advice. Leave London--come down here and take chambers in the town, and go the North-Eastern Circuit. I'll promise you--for our firm alone--plenty of work. You'll get more--there's lots of work waiting here for a good, smart young barrister. Ah!--you smile, but I know what I'm talking about. You don't know Barford men. They believe in the old adage that one should look at home before going abroad. They're terribly litigious, too, and if you were here, on the spot, they'd give you work. What do you say, Collingwood?" "That sounds very tempting. But I was thinking of sticking to London." "Not one hundredth part of the chance in London that there is here!" affirmed Eldrick. "We badly want two or three barristers in this place. A man who's really well up in commercial and company law would soon have his hands full. There's work, I tell you. Take my advice, and come!" "I couldn't come--in any case--for a few months," said Collingwood, musingly. "Of course, if you really think there's an opening----" "I know there is!" asserted Eldrick. "I'll guarantee you lots of work--our work. I'm sick of fetching men down all the way from town, or getting them from Leeds. Come!--and you'll see." "I might come in a few months' time, and try things for a year or two," replied Collingwood. "But I'm off to India, you know, next week, and I shall be away until the end of spring--four months or so." "To India!" exclaimed Eldrick. "What are you going to do there?" "Sir John Standridge," said Collingwood, mentioning a famous legal luminary of the day, "is going out to Hyderabad to take certain evidence, and hold a sort of inquiry, in a big case, and I'm going with him as his secretary and assistant--I was in his chambers for two years, you know. We leave next week, and we shall not be back until the end of April." "Lucky man!" remarked the solicitor. "Well, when you return, don't forget what I've said. Come back!--you'll not regret it. Come and settle down. Bye-the-bye, you're not engaged, are you?" "Engaged?" said Collingwood. "To what--to whom--what do you mean?" "Engaged to be married," answered Eldrick coolly. "You're not? Good! If you want a wife, there's Miss Mallathorpe. Nice, clever girl, my boy--and no end of what Barford folk call brass. The very woman for you."