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the door upon the sleeping patriarch.
The next moment the pair had jumped into the baggage van.
'What's the row about your Uncle Joseph?' enquired the younger
traveller, mopping his brow. 'Does he object to smoking?'
'I don't know that there's anything the row with him,' returned the
other. 'He's by no means the first comer, my Uncle Joseph, I can tell
you! Very respectable old gentleman; interested in leather; been to Asia
Minor; no family, no assets--and a tongue, my dear Wickham, sharper than
a serpent's tooth.'
'
Cantankerous old party, eh?' suggested Wickham.
'Not in the least,' cried the other; 'only a man with a solid talent
for being a bore; rather cheery I dare say, on a desert island, but on
a railway journey insupportable. You should hear him on Tonti, the ass
that started tontines. He's incredible on Tonti.'
'By Jove!' cried Wickham, 'then you're one of these Finsbury tontine
fellows. I hadn't a guess of that.'
'Ah!' said the other, 'do you know that old boy in the carriage is worth
a hundred thousand pounds to me? There he was asleep, and nobody there
but you! But I spared him, because I'm a Conservative in politics.'
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