Waterbuck, Q.C., had barely screwed round on his elbow to chat with his Junior before Mr. Justice Bentham himself appeared—­a thin, rather hen-like man, with a little stoop, clean-shaven under his snowy wig.  Like all the rest of the court, Waterbuck rose, and remained on his feet until the judge was seated.  James rose but slightly; he was already comfortable, and had no opinion of Bentham, having sat next but one to him at dinner twice at the Bumley Tomms’.  Bumley Tomm was rather a poor thing, though he had been so successful.  James himself had given him his first brief.  He was excited, too, for he had just found out that Bosinney was not in court.

‘Now, what’s he mean by that?’ he kept on thinking.

The case having been called on, Waterbuck, Q.C., pushing back his papers, hitched his gown on his shoulder, and, with a semi-circular look around him, like a man who is going to bat, arose and addressed the Court.

The facts, he said, were not in dispute, and all that his Lordship would be asked was to interpret the correspondence which had taken place between his client and the defendant, an architect, with reference to the decoration of a house.  He would, however, submit that this correspondence could only mean one very plain thing.  After briefly reciting the history of the house at Robin Hill, which he described as a mansion, and the actual facts of expenditure, he went on as follows: 

“My client, Mr. Soames Forsyte, is a gentleman, a man of property, who would be the last to dispute any legitimate claim that might be made against him, but he has met with such treatment from his architect in the matter of this house, over which he has, as your lordship has heard, already spent some twelve—­some twelve thousand pounds, a sum considerably in advance of the amount he had originally contemplated, that as a matter of principle—­and this I cannot too strongly emphasize—­as a matter of principle, and in the interests of others, he has felt himself compelled to bring this action.  The point put forward in defence by the architect I will suggest to your lordship is not worthy of a moment’s serious consideration.”  He then read the correspondence.

His client, “a man of recognised position,” was prepared to go into the box, and to swear that he never did authorize, that it was never in his mind to authorize, the expenditure of any money beyond the extreme limit of twelve thousand and fifty pounds, which he had clearly fixed; and not further to waste the time of the court, he would at once call Mr. Forsyte.

Soames then went into the box.  His whole appearance was striking in its composure.  His face, just supercilious enough, pale and clean-shaven, with a little line between the eyes, and compressed lips; his dress in unostentatious order, one hand neatly gloved, the other bare.  He answered the questions put to him in a somewhat low, but distinct voice.  His evidence under cross-examination savoured of taciturnity.