Well, the consultation came off, at length, at Mr. Mortmain's chambers, at eight o'clock in the evening. A few minutes before that hour, Messrs. Quirk and Gammon were to be seen in the clerk's room, in civil conversation with that prim functionary, who explained to them that he did all Mr. Mortmain's drafting—pupils were so idle; that Mr. Mortmain did not score out much of what he (the aforesaid clerk) had drawn; that he noted up Mr. Mortmain's new cases for him in the reports, Mr. M. having so little time; and that the other day the Vice-Chancellor called on Mr. Mortmain—with several other matters of that sort, calculated to enhance the importance of Mr. Mortmain; who, as the clerk was asking Mr. Gammon, in a good-natured way, how long Mr. Frankpledge had been in practice, and where his chambers were—made his appearance, with a cheerful look and a bustling gait, having just walked down from his house in Queen's Square, with a comfortable bottle of old port on board. Shortly afterwards Mr. Frankpledge arrived, followed by his little clerk, bending beneath two bags of books, (unconscious bearer of as much law as had well-nigh split thousands of learned heads, and broken tens of thousands of hearts, in the making of, being destined to have a similar but far greater effect in the applying of,) and the consultation began.
As Frankpledge entered, he could not help casting a sheep's eye towards a table that glistened with such an array of "papers," (a tasteful arrangement of Mr. Mortmain's clerk before every consultation;) and down sat the two conveyancers and the two attorneys. I devoutly wish I had time to describe the scene at length; but greater events are pressing upon me. The two conveyancers fenced with one another for some time very guardedly and good-humoredly: pleasant was it to observe the conscious condescension of Mortmain, the anxious energy and volubility of Frankpledge. When Mr. Mortmain said anything that seemed weighty or pointed, Quirk looked with an elated air, a quick triumphant glance, at Gammon; who, in his turn, whenever Mr. Frankpledge quoted an "old case" from Bendloe, Godbolt, or the Year Books, (which, having always piqued himself on his almost exclusive acquaintance with the modern cases, he made a point of doing,) gazed at Quirk with a smile of placid superiority. Mr. Frankpledge talked almost the whole time; Mr. Mortmain, immovable in the view of the case which he had taken in his "opinion," listened with an attentive, good-natured air, ruminating pleasantly the while upon the quality of the port he had been drinking, (the first of the bin which he had tasted,) and upon the decision which the Chancellor might come to on a case brought into court on his advice, and which had been argued that afternoon. At last Frankpledge unwittingly fell foul of a favorite crotchet of Mortmain's—and at it they went, hammer and tongs, for nearly twenty minutes, (it had nothing whatever to do with the case they were consulting upon.) In the end, Mortmain of course adhered to his points, and Frankpledge intrenched himself in his books; each slightly yielded to the views of the other on immaterial points, (or what would have appeared the use of the consultation?) but did that which both had resolved upon doing from the first, i. e. sticking to his original opinion. Both had talked an amazing deal of deep law, which had at least one effect, viz. it fairly drowned both Quirk and Gammon, who, as they went home, with not (it must be owned) the clearest perceptions in the world of what had been going on, (though, before going to the consultation, each had really known something about the case,) stood each stoutly by his conveyancer's opinion, each protesting that he had never been once misled—Quirk by Mortmain, or Gammon by Frankpledge—and each resolved to give his man more of the conveyancing business of the house than he had before. I grieve to add, that they parted that night with a trifle less of cordiality than had been their wont. In the morning, however, this little irritation had passed away; and they agreed, before giving up the case, to take the final opinion of Mr. Tresayle—the great Mr. Tresayle. He was, indeed, a wonderful conveyancer—a perfect miracle of real-property law-learning. He had had such an enormous practice for forty-five years, that for the last ten he had never put his nose out of chambers for pure want of time, and at last of inclination; and had been so conversant with Norman French and law Latin, in the old English letter, that he had almost entirely forgotten how to write the modern English character. His opinions made their appearance in three different kinds of handwriting. First, one that none but he and his old clerk could make out; secondly, one that none but he himself could read; and thirdly, one that neither he, nor his clerk, nor any one on earth, could decipher. The use of any one of these styles depended on—the difficulty of the case to be answered. If it were an easy one, the answer was very judiciously put into No. I.; if rather difficult, it, of course, went into No. II.; and if exceedingly difficult, (and also important,) it was very properly thrown into No. III.; being a question that really ought not to have been asked, and did not deserve an answer. The fruit within these uncouth shells, however, was precious. Mr. Tresayle's law was supreme over everybody's else. It was currently reported that Lord Eldon even (who was himself slightly acquainted with such subjects) reverently deferred to the authority of Mr. Tresayle; and would lie winking and knitting his shaggy eyebrows half the night, if he thought that Mr. Tresayle's opinion on a case, and his own, differed. This was the great authority to whom, as in the last resort, Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap resolved to appeal. To his chambers they, within a day or two after their consultation at Mr. Mortmain's, despatched their case, (making no mention of the opinion which had been previously taken,) with a highly respectable fee, and a special compliment to his clerk, hoping to hear from that awful quarter within a month—which was the earliest average period within which Mr. Tresayle's opinions found their way to his patient but anxious clients. It came at length, with a note from Mr. Prim, his clerk, intimating that they would find him, i. e. the aforesaid Mr. Prim, at his chambers the next morning, prepared to explain the opinion to them; having just had it read over to him by Mr. Tresayle, for it proved to be in No. II. The opinion occupied about two pages; and the handwriting bore a strong resemblance to Chinese or Arabic, with a quaint intermixture of the uncial Greek character—it was impossible to contemplate it without a certain feeling of awe! In vain did old Quirk squint at it, from all corners, for nearly a couple of hours, (having first called in the assistance of a friend of his, an old attorney of upwards of fifty years' standing;) nay—even Mr. Gammon, foiled at length, could not for the life of him refrain from a soft curse or two. Neither of them could make anything of it—(as for Snap, they never showed it to him; it was not within his province—i. e. the Insolvent Debtors' Court, the Old Bailey, the Clerkenwell Sessions, the Police Offices, the inferior business of the Common Law Courts, and the worrying of the clerks of the office—a department in which he was perfection itself.)
To their great delight, Mr. Tresayle took Mr. Mortmain's view of the case. Nothing could be more terse, perspicuous, and conclusive than the great man's opinion. Mr. Quirk was in raptures, and that very day sent to procure an engraving of Mr. Tresayle, which had lately come out, for which he paid 5s., and ordered it to be framed and hung up in his own room, where already grinned a quaint resemblance, in black profile, of Mr. Mortmain, cheek by jowl with that of a notorious traitor who had been hanged in spite of Mr. Quirk's best exertions. In special good-humor, he assured Mr. Gammon, (who was plainly somewhat crestfallen about Mr. Frankpledge,) that everybody must have a beginning; that even he himself (Mr. Quirk) had been once only a beginner.
Once fairly on the scent, Messrs. Quirk and Gammon soon began, secretly but energetically, to push their inquiries in all directions. They discovered that Gabriel Tittlebat Titmouse, having spent the chief portion of his blissful days as a cobbler at Whitehaven, had died in London, somewhere about the year 1793. At this point they stood for a long while, in spite of two advertisements, to which they had been driven with the greatest reluctance, for fear of attracting the attention of those most interested in thwarting their efforts. Even that part of the affair had been managed somewhat skilfully. It was a stroke of Mr. Gammon's to advertise not for "Heir-at-Law," but "Next of Kin," as the reader has seen. The former might have challenged the notice of unfriendly curiosity, which the latter was hardly calculated to attract. At length—at the "third time of asking"—up turned Tittlebat Titmouse, in the way which we have seen. His relationship with Mr. Gabriel Tittlebat Titmouse was indisputable; in fact, he was (to adopt his own words) that "deceased person's" son and heir-at-law.
The reader may guess the chagrin and disgust of Mr. Gammon at the appearance, manners, and character of the person whom he fully believed, on first seeing him at Messrs. Tag-rag's, to be the rightful owner of the fine estates held by one who, as against Mr. Titmouse, had no more real title to them than had Mr. Tag-rag; and for whom their house was to undertake the very grave risk and expense of instituting such proceedings as would be requisite to place Mr. Titmouse in the position which they believed him entitled to occupy—having to encounter a hot and desperate opposition at every point, from those who had nine-tenths of the law—to wit, possession—on their side, on which they stood as upon a rock; and with immense means for carrying on the war defensive. That Messrs. Quirk, Gammon, and Snap did not contemplate undertaking all this, without having calculated upon its proving well worthy their while, was only reasonable. They were going voluntarily to become the means of conferring immense benefits upon one who was a total stranger to them—who had not a penny to spend upon the prosecution of his own rights. Setting aside certain difficulties which collected themselves into two awkward words, Maintenance and Champerty, and stared them in the face whenever they contemplated any obvious method of securing the just reward of their enterprise and toils—setting aside all this, I say, it might turn out, only after a ruinous expenditure had been incurred, that the high authorities which had sanctioned their proceedings in point of law, had expressed their favorable opinions on a state of facts, which, however satisfactorily they looked on paper, could not be substantiated, if keenly sifted, and determinedly resisted. All this, too—all their time, labor, and money, to go for nothing—on behalf of a vulgar, selfish, ignorant, presumptuous, ungrateful puppy, like Titmouse!—Well indeed, therefore, might Mr. Gammon, as we have seen he did, give himself and partners a forty-eight hours' interval, between his interview with Titmouse and formal introduction of him to the firm, in which to consider their position and mode of procedure. The taste of his quality which that first interview afforded them all—so far surpassing all that the bitter description of him given to them by Mr. Gammon had prepared them for—filled the partners with inexpressible disgust, and would have induced them to throw up the whole affair—so getting rid both of it, and of him, together. But then, on the other hand, there were certain very great advantages, both of a professional and even directly pecuniary kind, which it would have been madness indeed for any office lightly to throw away. It was really, after all, an unequal struggle between feeling and interest. If they should succeed in unseating the present wrongful possessor of a very splendid property, and putting in his place the rightful owner, by means alone of their own professional ability, perseverance, and heavy pecuniary outlay, (a fearful consideration, truly, but Mr. Quirk had scraped together some thirty thousand pounds!) what recompense could be too great for such resplendent services? To say nothing of the éclat which it would gain for their office, in the profession and in the world at large, and the substantial and permanent advantages to the firm, if, as they ought to be, they were intrusted with the general management of the property by the new and inexperienced and confiding owner—ay, but there was the rub! What a disheartening and disgusting specimen of such new owner had disclosed itself to their anxiously expecting but soon recoiling eyes—always, however, making due allowances for one or two cheering indications, on Mr. Titmouse's part, of a certain rapacious and litigious humor, which might hereafter right pleasantly and profitably occupy their energies! Their professional position, and their interests had long made them sharp observers; but when did ever before low and disgusting qualities force themselves into revolting prominence, as those of Mr. Titmouse had done, in the very moment of an expected display of the better feelings of human nature—such as enthusiastic gratitude? They had, in their time, had to deal with some pleasant specimens of humanity, to be sure; but when with any more odious and impracticable than Tittlebat Titmouse threatened to prove himself? What hold could they get upon such a character as his? Beneath all his coarseness and weakness, there was a glimmer of low cunning which might suffice to keep their superior and practised astuteness at its full stretch. These were difficulties, cheerless enough in the contemplation, truly; but, nevertheless, the partners could not bear the idea of escaping from them by throwing up the affair altogether. Then came the question—How were they to manage Mr. Titmouse?—how acquire an early and firm hold of him, so as to convert him into a capital client? His fears and his interests were obviously the engines with which their experienced hands were to work; and several long and most anxious consultations had Messrs. Quirk and Gammon had on this important matter. The first great question with them was—To what extent, and when, they should acquaint him with the nature of his expectations.
Gammon was for keeping him comparatively in the dark, till success was within reach: during that interval, (which might be a long one,) by alternately stimulating his hopes and fears; by habituating him to an entire dependence on them; by persuading him of the prodigious extent of their exertions and sacrifices on his behalf—they might do something; mould him into a shape fit for their purposes, and persuade him that his affairs must needs go to ruin but in their hands. Something like this was the scheme of the cautious, acute, and placid Gammon. Mr. Quirk, however, (with whom, as will be hereafter shown, had originated the whole discovery,) thought thus:—tell the fellow at once the whole extent of what we can do for him, viz. turn a half-starving linen-draper's shopman into the owner of £10,000 a-year, and of a great store of ready money. This will, in a manner, stun him into submission, and make him at once and for all what we want him to be. He will immediately fall prostrate with reverent gratitude—looking at us, moreover, as three gods, who, at our will, can shut him out of heaven. "That's the way to bring down your bird," said Mr. Quirk; and Mr. Quirk had been forty years in practice—had made the business what it was—still held half of it in his own hands, (two-thirds of the remaining half being Gammon's, and the residue Snap's:) and Gammon, moreover, had a very distinct perception that the funds for carrying on the war would come out of the tolerably well-stored pockets of the august head of the firm. So, after a long discussion, he openly yielded his opinion to that of Mr. Quirk—cherishing, however, a very warm respect for it in his own bosom. As for Snap, that distinguished member of the firm was very little consulted in the matter; which had not yet been brought to that stage where his powerful energies could come into play. He had of course, however, heard a good deal of what was going on; and knew that ere long there would be the copying out and serving of the Lord knows how many copies of declarations in ejectment, motions against the casual ejector, and so forth—so far at least as he was "up to" all those quaint and anomalous proceedings. It had, therefore, been at length agreed that the communication to Titmouse, on his first interview, of the full extent of his splendid expectations, should depend upon the discretion of Mr. Quirk. The reader has seen the unexpected turn which matters took upon that important occasion; and if it proved Quirk's policy to be somewhat inferior in point of discretion and long-sightedness to that of Gammon, still it must be owned that the latter had cause to admire the rapid generalship with which Mr. Quirk had obviated the consequences of his false move—not ill seconded by Snap. What could have been more judicious than his reception of Titmouse, on the occasion of his being led in again by the subtle Gammon?
The next and greatest matter was, how to obtain any hold upon such a person as Titmouse had shown himself, so as to secure to themselves, in the event of success, the remuneration to which they considered themselves entitled. Was it so perfectly clear that, if he felt disposed to resist it, they could compel him to pay the mere amount of their bill of costs?
Suppose he should turn round upon them, and have their Bill taxed—Mr. Quirk grunted with fright at the bare thought. Then there was a slapping quiddam honorarium extra—undoubtedly for that they must, they feared, trust to the honor and gratitude of Mr. Titmouse; and a pretty taste of the quality of that animal they had already experienced! Such a disposition as his, to have to rely upon for the prompt settlement of a bill of thousands of pounds of costs! and, besides that, to have it to look to for the payment of at least some five or perhaps ten thousand pounds douceur—nay, and this was not all. Mr. Quirk had, as well as Mr. Gammon, cast many an anxious eye on the following passages from Blackstone's Commentaries:—
"Maintenance is an officious intermeddling in a suit that no way belongs to one, by 'maintaining' or assisting either party with money, or otherwise, to prosecute or defend it.... It is an offence against public justice, as it keeps alive strife and contention, and perverts the remedial process of the law into an engine of oppression.... The punishment by common law is fine and imprisonment, and by statute 32 Hen. VIII. c. 9, a forfeiture of £10!
"Champerty—(campi partitio)—is a species of Maintenance, and punished in the same manner; being a bargain with a plaintiff or defendant 'campum partiri,' to divide the land, or other matter sued for, between them, if they prevail at law; whereupon the champertor is to carry on the suit at his own expense.... These pests of civil society, that are perpetually endeavoring to disturb the repose of their neighbors, and officiously interfering in other men's quarrels, even at the hazard of their own fortunes, were severely animadverted on by the Roman law; and they were punished by the forfeiture of a third part of their goods, and perpetual infamy."[[4]]