Mr. Scantlebray was a tall, lean man, with light gray eyes, a red face, and legs and arms that he shook every now and then as though they were encumbrances to his trunk and he was going to shake them off, as a poodle issuing from a bath shakes the water out of his locks. Mr. Cargreen was a bullet-headed man, with a white neckcloth, gray whiskers, a solemn face, and a sort of perpetual “Let-us-pray” expression on his lips and in his eyes—a composing of his interior faculties and abstraction from worldly concerns.
“I am here,” said Mr. Scantlebray, “as adviser and friend—you understand, old man—of the orphings and their haunt.”
“And I,” said Mr. Cargreen, “am ditto to the incoming rector.”
“And what do you get out of this visit!” asked Mr. Scantlebray, who was a frank man.
“Only three guineas as a fee,” said Mr. Cargreen. “And you?”
“Ditto, old man—three guineas. You understand, I am not here as valuer to-day.”
“Nor I—only as adviser.”
“Exactly! Taste this port. ’Taint bad—out of the cellar of the old chap. Told auntie I must have it, to taste and give opinion on.”
“And what are you going to do to-day?”
“I’m going to have one or two little things pulled down, and other little things put to rights.”