On Monday I rose early, and went out for a bit of air before the scene with Mr. Dix.  Returning, I saw a coach with his Lordship’s arms on the panels, and there was Comyn himself in my great chair at the window, where he had been deposited by Banks and his footman.  I stared as on one risen from the dead.

“Why, Jack, what are you doing here?” I cried.

He replied very offhand, as was his manner at such times: 

“Blicke vows that Chartersea and Lewis have qualified for the College of Surgeons,” says he.  “They are both born anatomists.  Your job under the arm was the worst bungle of the two, egad, for Lewis put his sword, pat as you please, between two of my organs (cursed if I know their names), and not so much as scratched one.”

“Look you, Jack,” said I, “I am not deceived.  You have no right to be here, and you know it.”

“Tush!” answered his Lordship; “I am as well as you.”  And he took snuff to prove the assertion.  “Why the devil was you not in Brook Street yesterday to tell me that your uncle had swindled you?  I thought I was your friend,” says he, “and I learn of your misfortune through others.”

“It is because you are my friend, and my best friend, that I would not worry you when you lay next door to death on my account,” I said, with emotion.

And just then Banks announced Mr. Dix.

“Let him wait,” said I, greatly disturbed.

“Show him up!” said my Lord, peremptorily.

“No, no!” I protested; “he can wait.  We shall have no business now.”

But Banks was gone.  And I found out, long afterward, that it was put up between them.

The agent swaggered in with that easy assurance he assumed whenever he got the upper hand.  He was the would-be squire once again, in top-boots and a frock.  I have rarely seen a man put out of countenance so easily as was Mr. Dix that morning when he met his Lordship’s fixed gaze from the arm-chair.

“And so you are turned Jew?” says he, tapping his snuffbox.  “Before you go ahead so fast again, you will please to remember, d—­n you, that Mr. Carvel is the kind that does not lose his friends with his fortune.”

Mr. Dix made a salaam, which was so ludicrous in a squire that my Lord roared with laughter, and I feared for his wound.

“A man must live, my Lord,” sputtered the agent.  His discomfiture was painful.

“At the expense of another,” says Comyn, dryly.  “That is your motto in Change Alley.”

“If you will permit, Jack, I must have a few words in private with Mr. Dix,” I cut in uneasily.

His Lordship would be damned first.  “I am not accustomed to be thwarted, Richard, I tell you.  Ask the dowager if I have not always had my way.  I am not going to stand by and see a man who saved my life fall into the clutches of an usurer.  Yes, I said usurer, Mr. Dix.  My attorney, Mr. Kennett, of Lincoln’s Inn, has instructions to settle with you.”