his books and papers into Mr. Jaggers's room, and one of the up-
stairs clerks came down into the outer office. Finding such clerk on
Wemmick's post that morning, I knew what was going on; but I
was not sorry to have Mr. Jaggers and Wemmick together, as
Wemmick would then hear for himself that I said nothing to com-
promise him.

My appearance with my arm bandaged and my coat loose over
my shoulders, favoured my object. Although I had sent Mr. Jag-
gers a brief account of the accident as soon as I had arrived in
town, yet I had to give him all the details now; and the specialty
of the occasion caused our talk to be less dry and hard, and less
strictly regulated by the rules of evidence, than it had been before.
Whil e I described the disaster, Mr. Jaggers stood, according to his
wont, before the fire. Wemmick leaned back in his chair, staring
at me, with his hands in the pockets of his trousers, and his pen put
horizontally into the post. The two brutal casts, always insepar-
able in my mind from the official proceedings, seemed to be con-
gestively considering whether they didn't smell fire at the present
moment.

My narrative finished, and their questions exhausted, I then
produced Miss Havisham's authority to receive the nine hundred
pounds for Herbert. Mr. Jaggers's eyes retired a little deeper into
his head when I handed him the tablets, but he presently handed
them over to Wemmick, with instructions to draw the cheque for
his signature. While that was in course of being done, I looked on
at Wemmick as he wrote, and Mr. Jaggers, poising and swaying
himself on his well-polished boots, looked on at me. 'I am sorry,
Pip,' said he, as I put the cheque in my pocket, when he had
signed it, 'that we do nothing for you.'

'Miss Havisham was good enough to ask me,' I returned,
whether she could do nothing for me, and I told her No.'

'Everybody should know his own business,' said Mr. Jaggers.
And I saw Wemmick's lips form the words 'portable property.'

'I should not have told her No, if I had been you,' said Mr.
Jaggers; 'but every man ought to know his own business best.'

'Every man's business, ' said Wemmick, rather reproachfully to-
wards me, 'is "portable property."'

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