The waiter re-entered; “Sir,” said he to Linden, “your room is quite ready.”
“I am glad to hear it,” said Clarence, rising. “Mr. Brown, I have the honour of wishing you a good evening.”
“Stay, sir—stay; you have not looked into these things belonging to the late Lady Waddilove.”
“Another time,” said Clarence, hastily.
“To-morrow, at ten o’clock,” muttered Mr. Brown.
“I am exceedingly glad I have got rid of that fellow,” said Linden to himself, as he stretched his limbs in his easy-chair, and drank off the last glass of his pint of port. “If I have not already seen, I have already guessed, enough of the world, to know that you are to look to your pockets when a man offers you a present; they who ‘give,’ also ‘take away.’ So here I am in London, with an order for 1000 pounds in my purse, the wisdom of Dr. Latinas in my head, and the health of eighteen in my veins; will it not be my own fault if I do not both enjoy and make myself—”
And then, yielding to meditations of future success, partaking strongly of the inexperienced and sanguine temperament of the soliloquist, Clarence passed the hours till his pillow summoned him to dreams no less ardent and perhaps no less unreal.
CHAPTER VIII.
“Oh, how I long to be employed!”—Every Man in his Humour.