“I’ll tell you,” said Fledgeby. “I like to hear you ask it, because it’s looking alive. It’s what I should expect to find in one of your sagacious understanding. Now, candidly.”

“Eh?” cried Miss Jenny.

“I said, now candidly,” Mr Fledgeby explained, a little put out.

“Oh-h!”

“I should be glad to countermine him, respecting the handsome gal, your friend. He means something there. You may depend upon it, Judah means something there. He has a motive, and of course his motive is a dark motive. Now, whatever his motive is, it’s necessary to his motive” — Mr Fledgeby’s constructive powers were not equal to the avoidance of some tautology here — “that it should be kept from me, what he has done with her. So I put it to you, who know: What has he done with her? I ask no more. And is that asking much, when you understand that it will pay?”

Miss Jenny Wren, who had cast her eyes upon the bench again after her last interruption, sat looking at it, needle in hand but not working, for some moments. She then briskly resumed her work, and said with a sidelong glance of her eyes and chin at Mr Fledgeby:

“Where d’ye live?”

“Albany, Piccadilly,” replied Fledgeby.

“When are you at home?”

“When you like.”

“Breakfast-time?” said Jenny, in her abruptest and shortest manner.

“No better time in the day,” said Fledgeby.

“I’ll look in upon you to-morrow, young man. Those two ladies,” pointing to dolls, “have an appointment in Bond Street at ten precisely. When I’ve dropped ’em there, I’ll drive round to you. With a weird little laugh, Miss Jenny pointed to her crutch-stick as her equipage.

“This is looking alive indeed!” cried Fledgeby, rising.

“Mark you! I promise you nothing,” said the dolls” dressmaker, dabbing two dabs at him with her needle, as if she put out both his eyes.

“No no. I understand,” returned Fledgeby. “The damage and waste question shall be settled first. It shall be made to pay; don’t you be afraid. Good-day, Miss Jenny.”

“Good-day, young man.”

Mr Fledgeby’s prepossessing form withdrew itself; and the little dressmaker, clipping and snipping and stitching, and stitching and snipping and clipping, fell to work at a great rate; musing and muttering all the time.

“Misty, misty, misty. Can’t make it out. Little Eyes and the wolf in a conspiracy? Or Little Eyes and the wolf against one another? Can’t make it out. My poor Lizzie, have they both designs against you, either way? Can’t make it out. Is Little Eyes Pubsey, and the wolf Co? Can’t make it out. Pubsey true to Co, and Co to Pubsey? Pubsey false to Co, and Co to Pubsey? Can’t make it out. What said Little Eyes? “Now, candidly?” Ah! However the cat jumps, he’s a liar. That’s all I can make out at present; but you may go to bed in the Albany, Piccadilly, with that for your pillow, young man!” Thereupon, the little dressmaker