“What was it, then?”
“It is a place he has given me,—a Registrarship of something in his Court, that he has been fighting the Castle people about for eighteen years, and to which Heaven knows if he has the right of appointment this minute.”
“What'sit worth?”
“A thousand a year net. There were pickings,—at least, the last man made a good thing of them,—but there are to be no more. We are to inaugurate, as the newspapers say, a reign of integrity and incorruptibility.”
“So much the better.”
“So much the worse,” say I. “My motto is, Full batta and plenty of loot; and it's every man's motto, only that every man is not honest enough to own it.”
“And when are you to enter upon the duties of your office?”
“Immediately. I 'm to be sworn in—there's an oath, it seems—this day week, and we 're to take up our abode at the Priory till we find a house to suit us.”
“At the Priory?”
“Yes. May I light a cigarette, mother: only one? He gave the invitation most royally. A whole wing is to be at our disposal. He said nothing about the cook or the wine-cellar, and these are the very ingredients I want to secure.”