The philosophical gull, who never learned wisdom, was touched by this in the most assailable point.
‘It’s true,’ he said, ‘Joe,—though how you’ve found it out I can’t tell—that I have carried out a suggestion or two, and put in something that seemed to me the logical consequence of what he said. But nothing practical, for I don’t understand the practical part. And how does that sort of thing give me any real claim?’
‘Guv’nor,’ repeated Joe, ‘you needn’t tell me. I know you, and how you’re always giving up to other folks. It’s half yours and more, I’ll be bound. And the best you could do for the young ’un is just what I tells you. I’m practical, I am. If it was anything in my way, I’d do it like a shot; but it ain’t in my way. The outsides o’ things has a deal of power in this world. You in your fine respectable suit, you can go where you please like a prince. But me, it’s “Be off with you—get along with you;” they won’t say nothing of that sort to you. And you’ll just make the young man’s fortune, that’s what you’ll do. Say as he’s the very one to look after the works and knows all the practical part. They ought to settle something handsome on you at once as your share and take him on as foreman, or whatever it is; and in that way you’d both get the best of it and all done well.’
The convict philosopher shook his head. He rose up from the table and put the papers away. He admired the neatness of his own manuscript extremely, and he was of opinion that he had done John a great deal of good by the suggestions which he had worked out and the additions which he had made. It was possible that Joe might be right, and that the best thing he could do for his young employer was what the poor faithful fellow had suggested. He had himself a great admiration, after having been deprived of it so long, of his respectable suit and appearance, and there was a great deal of plausibility, he thought, in what the man said. But it was still clear to him that John might not think so. He was not very rigid himself upon any point of morals, after his long practice in thinking everything over, and blurring out to his own satisfaction the lines of demarcation between right and wrong; but he could understand that the young man, not having his experience, might think otherwise; and he had even a sympathy for his want of philosophical power in that respect. So he put everything aside very tidily, and put his hand upon Joe’s arm and drew him away, shaking his head, but not angry at the good fellow’s insistence. There was something in it—and it might doubtless be under certain circumstances the most kind thing that could be done for the young man. Still there was the difficulty that the young man might not see it in that light. And Mr. March accordingly put up the papers, and taking Joe by the arm, with a benevolent smile and a shake of the head, led him away.
It has been said that John’s rooms were in Westminster, not far from Great George Street, where the offices of Messrs. Barrett were, and where, as the reader needs not to be informed, various other engineers’ offices are to be seen. March’s eye caught the names involuntarily as he passed by. It was not that he was trifling with temptation, for he did not consider Joe’s suggestion as temptation. He was only turning over the possibilities in his mind, and merely as a matter of amusement, an exercise of fancy, just as he might have counted how many white horses passed in the street, or which windows were curtained and which not, he read over to himself the names on the doors. Messrs. Barrett’s was one which he weighed but afterwards rejected, as not liking the sound of it. Another quite near had a name that pleased him better—Messrs. Spender and Diggs. What a ludicrous combination! He laughed to himself at it, as it caught his eye. Spender and Diggs—it was highly suggestive, which was a thing dear to his mind at ease. It clung to his memory. He turned it round the other way to see how it would sound. Diggs and Spender: that was still more absurd.
And all the time Joe’s voice was running on with arguments, the form of which, simple and subtle and couched in that language of the rough which is always more or less picturesque, amused his companion much. Joe had penetrated sufficiently into the mind of his mate to know how to address him. And that mind began to work upon the matter, with the amusing addition of the name of Spender and Diggs thrown in, and a great deal of pleasurable occupation in a question entirely characteristic and full of the difficulties he loved.
The result was that March appeared in the morning as the landlady had said, and spent a short time, but only a very short time in John’s sitting-room. The copy was completed, carefully folded up, and put in a large envelope. All John’s notes, the originals, were scrupulously left in their place, and in perfect order. For in some points his conscience was of scrupulous nicety, and John’s notes were certainly his own and not to be tampered with. As he was going out with the large envelope in his breast pocket, John’s landlady appeared with the remonstrance which had been on her lips for some days.
‘You, sir, I’ve got no objections—a gentleman that’s pleasant spoken and respectable even if he ain’t my lodger, but only a friend, that’s a different thing:—— but your—— that man——’
‘My servant?’ said March, with a quick sense of the comicality of the situation.
‘Well, sir,’ said the woman, with hesitation; ‘I wouldn’t keep on a man like that in my service if I was you.’