"What is this Blake's manner?" asked Pringle.
"Perfectly self-possessed, cool and audacious."
"Is he venturesome?
"He'd play for his boots or his shirt, and then for his skin."
"Do you think, O'Brien, he'll get out of this with a whole skin?"
"He may, for you are not his lawyer," said O'Brien, with a laugh.
"It is an old form of joke," said the attorney, with a smile. "Do you know if he has got legal assistance?"
"Legal assistance!" cried O'Brien, scornfully. "Not he. He laughed when telling me some fellows said he ought to get legal assistance. Why, my dear Pringle, he'd give the best of you thirty out of a hundred, and win the game by making you give misses. When is this thing to begin?"
"Presently. Have you any notion of what he is going to say at the inquest?"
"I asked him. I told him the paper found in the handwriting of the deceased would be very awkward."