more room for my interesting personality in Australia than there seemed to be in the old country when I heard an eager, heavy footstep on the last flight. Footsteps generally stopped at the top of the flight before, where an eminent Old Bailey junior held out. These footsteps came upward and along; they were unknown and substantial. Evidently those of a solicitor—of weight. I felt that something important was going to happen.
There was no knock at the door, and in a moment who should fling himself into the room but Dick Smith.
“Not a bit of good living up all these stairs; you should begin on the ground floor. Time enough to come up here when you are all the fashion and the solicitors must come after you.”
“What are you doing in town?” I asked.
“M‘Lachlan .v Agnew and Others. Rolls Court, before Anderson, Official Referee. Pankhurst leads me, but he has gone back to Manchester. Shiress Will, Q.C., and Lewis Coward against us. What are you doing?”
“Nothing whatever,” I answered somewhat dismally.
“Come along and take a note for me this afternoon.”
I had been feeling like a gambler eternally cut out of the table, and here was a hand in some sort of game dealt for me to pick up. I caught hold of my blue bag, and putting a note on my door with some pride to say I was to be found at the Official
Referee’s Chambers in Rolls Court, followed Dick Smith up Chancery Lane.
There is a geographical secret about Chancery Lane that I have discovered. It leads straight to Manchester.