"I think I am," replied Steggars, with a sigh.
"Well—and if you want to have a chance of not going across the water afore your time, you'll get yourself defended, and the sooner the better, d'ye see. There's Quirk, Gammon, and Snap—my eyes! how they do thin this here place of ours, to be sure! The only thing is to get 'em soon; 'cause, ye see, they're so run after. Shall I send them to you?"
Steggars answered eagerly in the affirmative. In order to account for this spontaneous good-nature on the part of Grasp, I must explain that old Mr. Quirk had for years secured a highly respectable criminal practice, by having in his interest most of the officers attached to the police-offices and Newgate. He gave, in fact, systematic gratuities to these gentry, in order to get their recommendations to the persecuted individuals who came into their power. Very shortly after Grasp's messenger had reached Saffron Hill, with the intelligence that "there was something new in the trap," old Quirk bustled down to Newgate, and was introduced to Steggars, with whom he was closeted for some time. He took a lively interest in his new client, to whose narrative of his flight and capture he listened in a very kind and sympathizing way, lamenting the severity of the late statute applicable to the case;[[23]] and promised to do for him whatever his little skill and experience could do. He hinted however, that, as Mr. Steggars must be aware, a little ready money would be required, in order to fee counsel—whereat Steggars looked very dismal indeed, and knowing the state of his exchequer, imagined himself already on shipboard, on his way to Botany Bay. Old Mr. Quirk asked him if he had no friends who would raise a trifle for a "chum in trouble,"—and on Mr. Steggars answering in the negative, he observed the enthusiasm of the respectable old gentleman visibly and rapidly cooling down.
"But I'll tell you what, sir," said poor Steggars, suddenly, "if I haven't money, I may have money's worth at my command;—I've a little box, that's at my lodging, which those that catched me knew nothing of—and in which there is a trifle or two about the families and fortunes of some of the first folk in the best part of Yorkshire, that would be precious well worth looking after, to those who know how to follow up such matters."
Old Quirk hereat pricked up his ears, and asked his young friend how he got possessed of such secrets.
"Oh fie! fie!" said he, gently, as soon as Steggars had told him the practices of which I have already put the reader in possession.
"Ah—you may say fie! fie! if you like," quoth Steggars, earnestly; "but the thing is, not how they were come by, but what can be done with them, now they're got. For example, there's a certain member of parliament in Yorkshire, that, high as he may hold his head, has no more right to the estates that yield him a good ten thousand a-year than I have, but keeps some folk out of their own, that could pay some other folk a round sum to be put in the way of getting their own;" and that—intimated the suffering captive—was only one of the good things he knew of. Here old Quirk rubbed his chin, hemmed, fidgeted about in his seat, took off his glasses, wiped them, replaced them; and presently went through that ceremony again. He then said that he had had the honor of being concerned for a great number of gentlemen in Mr. Steggars' "present embarrassed circumstances," but who had always been able to command at least a five-pound note, at starting, to run a heat for liberty.
"Come, come, old gentleman," quoth Steggars, earnestly, "I don't want to go over the water before my time, if I can help it, I assure you; and I see you know the value of what I've got! Such a gentleman as you can turn every bit of paper I have in my box into a fifty-pound note."
"All this is moonshine, my young friend," said old Quirk, in an irresolute tone and manner.
"Ah! is it, though? To be able to tell the owner of a fat ten thousand a-year, that you can spring a mine under his feet at any moment—eh?—and no one ever know how you came by your knowledge. And if they wouldn't do what was handsome, couldn't you get the right heir—and wouldn't that—Lord! it would make the fortunes of half-a-dozen of the first houses in the profession!" Old Quirk got a little excited.