"Damn the Times!" was the polite answer; "I don't come here to read newspapers. Tell Mr. Todd that I must see him at once, or else I shall go elsewhere."

"I am much afraid, sir" began the managing clerk.

Mr. Meeson jumped up and grabbed his hat. "Now then, which is it to be?" he said.

"Oh, certainly, sir; pray be seated," answered the manager in great alarm-Meeson's business was not a thing to be lightly lost. "I will see Mr. Todd instantly," and he vanished.

Almost simultaneously with his departure an old lady was unceremoniously bundled out of an inner room, clutching feebly at a reticule full of papers and proclaiming loudly that her head was going round and round. The poor old soul was just altering her will for the eighteenth time in favour of a bran new charity, highly recommended by Royalty; and to be suddenly shot from the revered presence of her lawyer into the outer darkness of the clerks' office, was really too much for her.

In another minute, Mr. Meeson was being warmly, even enthusiastically, greeted by Mr. Todd himself. Mr. Todd was a nervous-looking, jumpy little man, who spoke in jerks and gushes in such a way as to remind the listener of a fire-hose through which water was being pumped intermittently.

How do you do, my dear sir? Delighted to have this pleasure," he began with a sudden gush, and then suddenly dried up as he noticed the ominous expression on the great man's brow. "I am sure I am very sorry that you were kept waiting, my dear sir; but I was at the moment engaged with an excellent and most Christian testator

Here he suddenly jumped and dried up again, for Mr. Meeson, without the slightest warning, ejaculated: "Curse your Christian testator! And look here, Todd, just you see that it does not happen again. I'm a Christian testator, too; and Christians of my cut aren't accustomed to be kept standing about just like officeboys or authors. See that it don't happen again,

"Oh, never mind all that—I want my will."

“Will—will— Forgive me a little confused, that's all. Your manner is so full of hearty old middle-age's kind of vigour

Here he stopped, more suddenly even than usual, for Mr. Meeson fixed him with his savage eye, and then jerked himself out of the room to look for the document in question.

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'Little idiot!" muttered Meeson; "I'll give him the sack, too, if he isn't more careful. By Jove! why

should I not have my own resident solicitor? I could get a sharp hand with a damaged character for about £300 a year, and I pay that old Todd quite £2000. There is a vacant place in the Hutches that I could turn into an office. Hang me, if I don't do it. I will make that little chirping grasshopper jump to some purpose, I'll warrant," and he chuckled at the idea.

Just then Mr. Todd returned with the will, and before he could begin to make any explanations his employer cut him short with a sharp order to read the gist of it.

This the lawyer went on to do. It was very short, and, with the exception of a few legacies, amounting in all to about twenty thousand pounds, bequeathed the testator's vast fortune and estates, including his (by far the largest) interest in the great publishing house, and his palace, with the paintings and other valuable contents, known as Pompadour Hall, to his nephew, Eustace H. Meeson.

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"Very well," he said, when the reading was finished; now give it to me."

Mr. Todd obeyed, and handed the document to his patron, who-animo revocandi—deliberately rent it into fragments with his strong fingers, and then completed its destruction by tearing it with his big white teeth. This done, he mixed the little pieces up, threw them on the floor, and stamped upon them with an air