"What strikes me, Mr. Dingwell, amounts, in short, to something like this. My poor brother, he has been unfortunate, about it, and--and _worse_, and he has done things, and I ask myself _why_ there should be an effort to obtrude him, and I answer myself, there's no reason, about it, and therefore I vote to have everything as it is, and I shall neither contribute my countenance, about it, nor money to any such undertaking, or--or--undertaking." "Then my book comes to the ground, egad." Lord Verney simply raised his head with a little sniff, as if he were smelling at a snuff-box. "Well, Arthur must have something, you know." "My brother, the Honourable Arthur Kiffyn Verney, is past receiving anything at my hands, and I don't think he probably looked for anything, about it, at any time from _yours_." "Well, but it's just the time for what I'm thinking of. You wouldn't give him a tombstone in his lifetime, I suppose, though you _are_ a genius. Now, I happen to know he wished a tombstone. _You_'d like a tombstone, though not now--time enough in a year or two, when you're fermenting in your lead case." "I'm not thinking of tombstones at present, sir, and it appears to me that you are giving yourself a very unusual latitude--about it." "I don't mean in the mausoleum at Ware. Of course that's a place where people who have led a decorous life putrify together. I meant at the small church of Penruthyn, where the scamps await judgment." "I--a--don't see that such a step is properly for the consideration of any persons--about it--outside the members of the Verney family, or more properly, of any but the representatives of that family," said Lord Verney, loftily, "and you'll excuse my not admitting, or--or, in fact, admitting any right in anyone else." "He wished it immensely." "I can't understand why, sir." "Nor I; but I suppose you all get them--all ticketed--eh? and I'd write the epitaph, only putting in essentials, though, egad! in such a life it would be as long as a newspaper." "I've already expressed my opinion, and--and things, and I have nothing to add." "Then the tombstone comes to the ground also?" "Anything _more_, sir?" "But, my lord, he showed an immense consideration for you." "I don't exactly recollect _how_." "By _dying_--you've got hold of everything, don't you see, and you grudge him a tablet in the little church of Penruthyn, by gad! I told your nephew he wished it, and I tell you he wished it; it's not stinginess, it's your mean pride." "You seem, Mr. Dingwell, to fancy that there's no limit to the impertinence I'll submit to." "I'm sure there's none almost--you better not ring the bell--you better think twice--he gave me that message, and he also left me a mallet--quite a toy--but a single knock of it would bring Verney House, or Ware, or this place, about your ears."