“Um,” replies FIBBINS, sinking into despondency, “not exactly.  PROSER didn’t quite like to decide against BLOWHARD, you know; so he—­so he—­er—­decided for him, in fact.  Of course we appeal.  It won’t,” goes on FIBBINS, more cheerfully, “do BLOWHARD’s clients a bit of good.  Only run their bill up.  I’m safe to win before the Court of Appeal.  Lord Justice GRILL a first-rate lawyer—­sure to reverse old PROSER.  I can,” he ends with conscious pride, “twist GRILL round my finger, so to speak.”

The idea of twisting a Lord Justice round one’s finger impresses me still more with DICK FIBBINS’s legal genius.  How lucky I am to have made his acquaintance!  Feel impelled to ask, as I do rather nervously, not knowing if a bitter disappointment does not await me.

“Do you—­er—­take legal pupils ever?”

I feel that I’ve put it in a way that sounds like asking him if he indulges in drink.  But FIBBINS evidently not offended.  He answers briskly, with engaging candour.

“Well, to tell you the truth, though I’ve often been asked to—­quite pestered about it, in fact—­I’ve never done so hitherto.  The Solicitors don’t like it quite—­makes ’em think one is wasting the time which ought to be given to their briefs on one’s own pups—­I mean pupils.”

Perhaps, after all, FIBBINS will dash my hopes (of becoming his “pup!” Query, isn’t the word infra dig.—­or merely “pleasantly colloquial?”) to the ground.

“I was,” I say boldly, “going to ask you if you would let me read with you.”

“Were you?” replies DICK, apparently intensely astonished at the idea; “By Jove!  I should be really sorry to disappoint you.  Yes,” he goes on in a burst of generosity, “I will make room for you—­there!”

This is really kind of DICK FIBBINS.  We finally arrange that I am to come in two days’ time—­at the usual, and rather pretentious, fee of one hundred guineas for a year’s “coaching”—­and begin work.

“You’ll see some good cases with me—­good fighting cases,” FIBBINS remarks, as I take my leave.  “When there are no briefs, why, you can read up the Law Reports, you know.  My books are quite at your disposal.”

“But,” I remark, a little surprised at that hint about no briefs—­I thought DICK FIBBINS had more than he knew what to do with—­“I suppose—­er—­there’s plenty of business going on here?”

“Oh, heaps,” replies FIBBINS, hastily.  Then, as if to do away with any bad impression which his thoughtless observation about no briefs might have occasioned in my mind, he says, heartily,—­

“And, when I take old PROSER up to the Court of Appeal, you shall come too, and hear me argue!”

I express suitable gratitude—­but isn’t it rather “contempt of Court” on FIBBINS’s part to talk about “taking up” a Judge?—­and feel, as I depart, that I shall soon see something of the real inner life of the Profession.