"And why not, Mr. Sharp?"
"That is quite an unnecessary question, and one that, you know, I should not answer, if I could. That which chiefly concerns you is, that I am ready to return the four thousand pounds at once, here on the spot, and that delays are dangerous. If you refuse, why, of course—and I rose from my chair—I must take back the money."
"Stay—stay! I will just consult with one or two gentlemen, and be with you again almost immediately."
In about five minutes he returned. "Well, Mr. Sharp," he said, "we had,
I suppose; better take the money—obtained, as you say, by mistake."
"Not at all; I said nothing about mistake. I told you it ought not to have been received by Andrews!"
"Well—well. I understand. I must, I suppose, give you a receipt?"
"Undoubtedly; and, if you please, precisely in this form."
I handed him a copy on a slip of paper. He ran it over, smiled, transcribed it on a stamp, signed it, and, as I handed him a check for the amount, placed it in my hands. We mutually bowed, and I went my way.
Notwithstanding Mr. Newton's opposition, who was naturally furious at the unexpected turn the affair had taken, the identity of the boy—whom that gentleman persisted in asserting to be dead and buried—was clearly established; and Mr. Archibald Andrews, on the day he became of age, received possession of his fortune. The four thousand pounds had of course been repaid out of Jesse Andrews's legacy. That person has, so to speak, since skulked through life, a mark for the covert scorn of every person acquainted with the very black transaction here recorded. This was doubtless a much better fate than he deserved; and in strict, or poetical justice, his punishment ought unquestionably to have been much greater—more apparent also, than it was, for example's sake. But I am a man not of fiction, but of fact, and consequently relate events, not as they precisely ought, but as they do, occasionally occur in lawyers' offices, and other unpoetical nooks and corners of this prosaic, matter-of-fact, working-day world.