“Mr. Nutty and Mr. Sudds, genl’men,” he said. “One on ’em, Mr. Nutty, I shall leave here in possession on a fi. fa., and Mr. Sudds will assist me in arresting Eustace Wilton on a ca. sa. and in taking on him a country walk to a spunging house.”
Old Wilton turned as pale as death, and groaned in bitter anguish. Young Vivian felt a flush of heat pass over his frame.
“Can nothing be done?” he asked of Jukes, earnestly.
Mr. Jukes raised his dirty hand to his mouth, and recklessly bit his foul thumb-nail. He plunged into a fit of reflection. Suddenly he raised his head, and said to his companions—
“Go outside a moment.”
They obeyed him, and quitted the room. Then he said to the youth—
“I hold warrants on two judgments against Wilton for one thousand pounds each. On the one I takes his traps, on the other I takes his body. So you see as he can’t satisfy ’em, young mister, he’ll be cleaned out, and become a reg’lar pauper, on the poor side, in quod; and he must rot in quod, for he can’t take the benefit of the hact, that I knows. That’s bad enuff, ain’t it?”
“It is horrible!” ejaculated Hal, with a glance of commiseration at the old man, who, with downcast eyes and set teeth, was listening to every word that fell from the man’s lips.
“Of course it is,” repeated Mr. Jukes, with an air of triumph. “Now he may save himself from all this, and like the princesses and queen’s children in fairy tales, live happy ever arterwards, if he chooses not to be hobstinate.” Mr. Jukes spoke with emphasis. “I wants him jes’ to sign a little bit o’ paper. He has only to make a flourish with a pen, and there he is a free man agin with all his traps about him.”
Mr. Jukes paused. Young Vivian approached old Wilton.