“Ah! that’s why I wanted to meet a solicitor. Charlie’s my cousin and awfully nice. Just ask Eleanor.”
“I’ll be content with your opinion.”
“But perhaps you know him. He’s in the Temple, Paper Buildings. Isn’t it ridiculous? Paper Buildings! I’ve heard of men of straw.”
“There are a good many Charlies in Paper Buildings, Miss des Forges. I suppose your cousin is a barrister?”
“That’s just what he is—a what d’ye call it barrister, short, no, not short.”
“Briefless, perhaps?”
“How clever of you to guess it. Eleanor must be right. And he’s delightfully poor, and gives luncheon to us girls in his chambers when we go up to town, and takes us down the river. He’s awfully good; but he’s only had one brief, and then the wretched people went and settled out of Court, as Charlie calls it. I think it was a conspiracy. I’d settle ’em,” and Miss des Forgess glared vindictively across the table, to the great discomfiture of the curate of an adjoining village, who blushed distressedly.
“Quite possibly,” agreed Edward. “So your cousin’s one chance of distinction was taken from him. Never mind, he may have another brief some day.”
Miss des Forges shook her head dolefully.
“Charlie says not. He writes for the papers and magazines now and lives on air. Tell me, how do barristers get on—at first, you know. What gives them the start?”