‘Hallo!’ said Sir George, staring anew.  ‘What do you want, my man?’

The intruder advanced a pace or two, and nervously crumpled his hat in his hands.  ‘If your honour pleases,’ he said, a smile feebly propitiative appearing in his face, ’I shall be glad to be of service to you.’

‘Of service?’ said Sir George, staring in perplexity.  ‘To me?’

‘In the way of my profession,’ the little man answered, fixing Sir George with two eyes as bright as birds’; which eyes somewhat redeemed his small keen features.  ‘Your honour was about to make your will.’  ’My will?’ Sir George cried, amazed; ‘I was about to—­’ and then in an outburst of rage, ’and if I was—­what the devil business is it of yours?’ he cried.  ‘And who are you, sir?’

The little man spread out his hands in deprecation.  ‘I?’ he said.  ’I am an attorney, sir, and everybody’s business is my business.’

Sir George gasped.  ‘You are an attorney!’ he cried.  ’And—­and everybody’s business is your business!  By God, this is too much!’ And seizing the bell-rope he was about to overwhelm the man of law with a torrent of abuse, before he had him put out, when the absurdity of the appeal and perhaps a happy touch in Peter’s last answer struck him; he held his hand, and hesitated.  Then, ‘What is your name, sir?’ he said sternly.

‘Peter Fishwick,’ the attorney answered humbly.

‘And how the devil did you know—­that I wanted to make a will?’

‘I was going upstairs,’ the lawyer explained.  ‘And the door was ajar.’

‘And you listened?’

‘I wanted to hear,’ said Peter with simplicity.

‘But what did you hear, sir?’ Soane retorted, scarcely able to repress a smile.

’I heard your honour tell your servant to lay out pen and paper, and to bring the landlord and another upstairs when he called you in the morning.  And I heard you bid him leave your sword.  And putting two and two together, respected sir, ‘Peter continued manfully,’ and knowing that it is only of a will you need three witnesses, I said to myself, being an attorney—­’

‘And everybody’s business being your business,’ Sir George muttered irritably.

’To be sure, sir—­it is a will, I said, he is for making.  And with your honour’s leave,’ Peter concluded with spirit, I’ll make it.’

‘Confound your impudence,’ Sir George answered, and stared at him, marvelling at the little man’s shrewdness.

Peter smiled in a sickly fashion.  ‘If your honour would but allow me?’ he said.  He saw a great chance slipping from him, and his voice was plaintive.

It moved Sir George to compassion.  ‘Where is your practice?’ he asked ungraciously.

The attorney felt a surprising inclination to candour.  ‘At Wallingford,’ he said, ‘it should be.  But—­’ and there he stopped, shrugging his shoulders, and leaving the rest unsaid.

‘Can you make a will?’ Sir George retorted.