Dick, smiting himself on the breast, 'are quite a different looking sort

of people, you may take your oath of that,sir.'

Quilp glanced at his free-spoken friend with a mingled expression of

cunning and dislike, and wringing his hand almost at the same

moment, declared that he was an uncommon character and had his

warmest esteem. With that they parted; Mr Swiveller to make the best

of his way home and sleep himself sober; and Quilp to cogitate upon

the discovery he had made, and exult in the prospect of the rich field

of enjoyment and reprisal it opened to him.

It was not without great reluctance and misgiving that Mr Swiveller,

next morning, his head racked by the fumes of the renowned

Schiedam, repaired to the lodging of his friend Trent (which was in the

roof of an old house in an old ghostly inn), and recounted by very slow

degrees what had yesterday taken place between him and Quilp. Nor

was it without great surprise and much speculation on Quilp's

probable motives, nor without many bitter comments on Dick

Swiveller's folly, that his friend received the tale.

I don't defend myself, Fred,' said the penitent Richard; 'but the fellow

has such a queer way with him and is such an artful dog, that first of

all he set me upon thinking whether there was any harm in telling

him, and while I was thinking, screwed it out of me. If you had seen

him drink and smoke, as I did, you couldn't have kept anything from

him. He's a Salamander you know, that's what he is.'

Without inquiring whether Salamanders were of necessity good

confidential agents, or whether a fire-proof man was as a matter of

course trustworthy, Frederick Trent threw himself into a chair, and,

burying his head in his hands, endeavoured to fathom the motives

which had led Quilp to insinuate himself into Richard Swiveller's

confidence; - for that the disclosure was of his seeking, and had not

been spontaneously revealed by Dick, was sufficiently plain from

Quilp's seeking his company and enticing him away.

The dwarf had twice encountered him when he was endeavouring to

obtain intelligence of the fugitives. This, perhaps, as he had not shown

any previous anxiety about them, was enough to awaken suspicion in

the breast of a creature so jealous and distrustful by nature, setting

aside any additional impulse to curiosity that he might have derived

from Dick's incautious manner. But knowing the scheme they had

planned, why should he offer to assist it? This was a question more

difficult of solution; but as knaves generally overreach themselves by

imputing their own designs to others, the idea immediately presented

itself that some circumstances of irritation between Quilp and the old

man, arising out of their secret transactions and not unconnected

perhaps with his sudden disappearance, now rendered the former

The Old Curiosity Shop