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'
Ha, ha, ha!' laughed the lawyer in an affected ecstasy. 'Oh, very good,
Sir! Oh, very good indeed! Quite eccentric! Dear me, what humour he
has!'
'Is that my Sally?' croaked the dwarf, ogling the fair Miss Brass. 'Is it
Justice with the bandage off her eyes, and without the sword and
scales? Is it the Strong Arm of the Law? Is it the Virgin of Bevis?'
'
What an amazing flow of spirits!' cried Brass. 'Upon my word, it's
quite extraordinary!'
'Open the door,' said Quilp, 'I've got him here. Such a clerk for you,
Brass, such a prize, such an ace of trumps. Be quick and open the
door, or if there's another lawyer near and he should happen to look
out of window, he'll snap him up before your eyes, he will.'
It is probable that the loss of the phoenix of clerks, even to a rival
practitioner, would not have broken Mr Brass's heart; but, pretending
great alacrity, he rose from his seat, and going to the door, returned,
introducing his client, who led by the hand no less a person than Mr
Richard Swiveller.
'
There she is,' said Quilp, stopping short at the door, and wrinkling up
his eyebrows as he looked towards Miss Sally; 'there is the woman I
ought to have married - there is the beautiful Sarah - there is the
female who has all the charms of her sex and none of their
weaknesses. Oh Sally, Sally!'
To this amorous address Miss Brass briefly responded 'Bother!'
'Hard-hearted as the metal from which she takes her name,' said
Quilp. 'Why don't she change it - melt down the brass, and take
another name?'
'Hold your nonsense, Mr Quilp, do,' returned Miss Sally, with a grim
smile. 'I wonder you're not ashamed of yourself before a strange young
man.'
'
'
The strange young man,' said Quilp, handing Dick Swiveller forward,
is too susceptible himself not to understand me well. This is Mr
Swiveller, my intimate friend - a gentleman of good family and great
expectations, but who, having rather involved himself by youthful
indiscretion, is content for a time to fill the humble station of a clerk -
humble, but here most enviable. What a delicious atmosphere!'
If Mr Quilp spoke figuratively, and meant to imply that the air
breathed by Miss Sally Brass was sweetened and rarefied by that
dainty creature, he had doubtless good reason for what he said. But if
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