"What more?"

"Very expensive, as these kind of folks usually are."

"What do you mean, sir?" asked Braddon, sternly.

"I mean what my words imply; she could not prove herself a wedded wife, so her case had not a leg to stand on; yet I was her friend and adviser."

"You think thus ill of her, and yet thrust yourself into her case."

"My dear sir, I am a lawyer, and lawyers must feed."

"Which is too often feeding what ought to be hung," replied Braddon, with all a soldier's contempt for the other's cloth.

"I repeat that I was her friend," urged Sharkley.

"God keep us from such friends, if all I have been told is true."

"But giving a mere sight of those papers can do you no harm."