enslaver had vanished before he closed them again; upon which the

apathetic youth ate a pound or so of steak with a sentimental

countenance, and fell fast asleep.

There was so much to say upstairs, and there were so many plans to

concert for elopement and matrimony in the event of old Wardle

continuing to be cruel, that it wanted only half an hour of dinner

when Mr Snodgrass took his final adieu. The ladies ran to Emily's

bedroom to dress, and the lover, taking up his hat, walked out of the

room. He had scarcely got outside the door, when he heard Wardle's

voice talking loudly, and looking over the banisters beheld him,

followed by some other gentlemen, coming straight upstairs. Knowing

nothing of the house, Mr Snodgrass in his confusion stepped hastily

back into the room he had just quitted, and passing thence into an

inner apartment (Mr Wardle's bedchamber), closed the door softly,

just as the persons he had caught a glimpse of entered the sitting-

room. These were Mr Wardle, Mr Pickwick, Mr Nathaniel Winkle, and

Mr Benjamin Allen, whom he had no difficulty in recognising by their

voices.

Very lucky I had the presence of mind to avoid them,' thought Mr

Snodgrass with a smile, and walking on tiptoe to another door near

the bedside; 'this opens into the same passage, and I can walk quietly

and comfortably away.'

There was only one obstacle to his walking quietly and comfortably

away, which was that the door was locked and the key gone.

Let us have some of your best wine to-day, waiter,' said old Wardle,

rubbing his hands.

'You shall have some of the very best, sir,' replied the waiter.

'Let the ladies know we have come in.'

'Yes, Sir.'

Devoutly and ardently did Mr Snodgrass wish that the ladies could

know he had come in. He ventured once to whisper, 'Waiter!' through

the keyhole, but the probability of the wrong waiter coming to his

relief, flashed upon his mind, together with a sense of the strong

resemblance between his own situation and that in which another

gentleman had been recently found in a neighbouring hotel (an

account of whose misfortunes had appeared under the head of 'Police'

in that morning's paper), he sat himself on a portmanteau, and

trembled violently.

The Pickwick Papers