"You had better--_yes_, ma'am, the money belongs to Messrs. Goldshed and Levi," said Mr. Larkin, interposing in the character of the _vir pietate gravis_. Sally Rumble, recollecting Mr. Dingwell's direction, "Let 'em have the money, too, if they press for it," obeyed, and slid her hand under his bolster, and under his head, from the other side where she was standing; and Dingwell, feeling the motion, I suppose, raised his head and stared with sunken eyes dismally at the three gentlemen, whom he plainly did not recognise, or possibly saw in the shapes of foxes, wolves, or owls, which Æsop would have metaphorically assigned them, and with a weary groan he closed his wandering eyes again, and sank down on the pillow. Miss Rumble drew forth a roll of bank-notes with a string tied round them. "Take the money, Levi," said Goldshed, drawing a step backward. "Take it yourself, guv'nor," said Levi, waving back Miss Sally Rumble, and edging back a little himself. "Well," said Goldshed, quietly, "I see you're afraid of that infection." "I believe you," answered Levi. "So am I," said Goldshed, uneasily. "And no wonder!" added Mr. Larkin, anticipating himself an invitation to accept the questionable trust. "Put them notes down on the table there," said Mr. Goldshed. And the three gentlemen eyed the precious roll of paper as I have seen people at a chemical lecture eye the explodable compounds on the professor's table. "I tell you what, ma'am," said Goldshed, "you'll please get a dry bottle and a cork, and put them notes into it, and cork it down, ma'am, and give it to Mr. Levi." "And count them first, please, Miss Rumble--shan't she, Mr. Goldshed?" suggested Mr. Larkin. "What for?--isn't the money ours?" howled Mr. Levi, with a ferocious stare on the attorney's meek face. "Only, Mr. Goldshed, with a view to distinctness, and to prevent possible confusion in any future account," said Mr. Larkin, who knew that Dingwell had got money from the Verneys, and thought that if there was anything recovered from the wreck he had as good a right to his salvage as another. Mr. Goldshed met his guileless smile with an ugly sneer, and said-- "Oh, count them, to be sure, for the gentleman. It isn't a ha'penny to me." So Miss Rumble counted seventy-five pounds in bank notes and four pounds in gold, which latter Mr. Goldshed committed to her in trust for the use of the patient, and the remainder were duly bottled and corked down according to Mr. Goldshed's grotesque precaution, and in this enclosure Mr. Levi consented to take the money in hand, and so it was deposited for the night in the iron safe in Messrs. Goldshed and Levi's office, to be uncorked in the morning by old Rosenthal, the cashier, who would, no doubt, be puzzled by the peculiarity of the arrangement, and with the aid of a cork-screw, lodged to the credit of the firm.