“I am really afraid I interrupt you,” began Cutbill.
“You do; I won't affect to deny it. You squash that despatch yonder, as effectually as if you threw the ink bottle over it. When once I get to talk with a man like you, I can't go back to the desk again. Don't you know it yourself? Haven't you felt it scores of times? The stupid man is got rid of just as readily as you throw a pebble out of your shoe; it is your clever fellow that pricks you like a nail.”
“I 'm sorry, my Lord, you should feel me so painfully,” said Cutbill, laughing, but with an expression that showed how the flattery had touched him.
“You don't know what a scrape I've got into about you.”
“About me?”
“Yes. My Lady heard you were here the other morning, and gave me a regular scolding for not having sent to tell her. You know you were old friends in Ireland.”
“I scarcely ventured to hope her Ladyship would remember me.”
“What! Not remember your admirable imitation of the speakers in the House?—your charming songs that you struck off with such facility,—the very best impromptus I ever heard. And, mark you, Cutbill, I knew Theodore Hook intimately,—I mean, difference of age and such-like considered, for I was a boy at the time,—and I say it advisedly, you are better than Hook.”
“Oh, my Lord, this is great flattery!”
“Hook was uncertain, too. He was what the French call 'journalier.' Now, that, you are not.”