“And when we’re all in the poor-house what’ll you do then?” said Mrs. Masters,—­with her handkerchief out at the spur of the moment.  Whenever she roused her husband to a state of bellicose ire by her taunts she could always reduce him again by her tears.  Being well aware of this he would bear the taunts as long as he could, knowing that the tears would be still worse.  He was so soft-hearted that when she affected to be miserable, he could not maintain the sternness of his demeanour and leave her in her misery.  “When everything has gone away from us, what are we to do?  My little bit of money has disappeared ever so long.”  Then she sat herself down in her chair and had a great cry.  It was useless for him to remind her that hitherto she had never wanted anything for herself or her children.  She was resolved that everything was going to the dogs because Goarly’s case had been refused.  “And what will all those sporting men do for you?” she repeated.  “I hate the very name of a gentleman;—­so I do.  I wish Goarly had killed all the foxes in the county.  Nasty vermin!  What good are the likes of them?”

Nickem, the senior clerk, was at first made almost as unhappy as Mrs. Masters by the weak decision to which his employer had come, and had in the first flush of his anger resolved to leave the office.  He was sure that the case was one which would just have suited him.  He would have got up the evidence as to the fertility of the land, the enormous promise of crop, and the ultimate absolute barrenness, to a marvel.  He would have proved clouds of pheasants.  And then Goarly’s humble position, futile industry, and general poverty might have been contrasted beautifully with Lord Rufford’s wealth, idleness, and devotion to sport.  Anything above the 7s. 6d. an acre obtained against the lord would have been a triumph, and he thought that if the thing had been well managed, they might probably have got 15s.  And then, in such a case, Lord Rufford could hardly have taxed the costs.  It was really suicide for an attorney to throw away business so excellent as this.  And now it had gone to Bearside whom Nickem remembered as a junior to himself when they were both young hobbledehoys at Norrington,—­a dirty, blear-eyed, pimply-faced boy who was suspected of purloining halfpence out of coat-pockets.  The thing was very trying to Nat Nickem.  But suddenly, before that Wednesday was over, another idea had occurred to him, and he was almost content.  He knew Goarly, and he had heard of Scrobby and Scrobby’s history in regard to the tenement at Rufford.  As he could not get Goarly’s case why should he not make something of the case against Goarly?  That detective was merely eking out his time and having an idle week among the public-houses.  If he could set himself up as an amateur detective he thought that he might perhaps get to the bottom of it all.  It is not a bad thing to be concerned on the same side with a lord when the lord is in earnest.  Lord Rufford was