As an individual who kept
himself to himself, he would be unlikely to communicate my business to
his kindred.
I lost no time in presenting myself at the house of business in
Ferrygate, and after giving the servant George Sheldon's card, and
announcing myself as concerned in a matter of business relating to the
Haygarth family, I was at once ushered into a prim counting-house,
where a dapper little old gentleman in spotless broadcloth, and a
cambric cravat and shirt frill which were soft and snowy as the plumage
of the swan, received me with old-fashioned courtesy. I was delighted
to find him seventy-five years of age at the most moderate computation,
and I should have been all the better pleased if he had been older. I
very quickly discovered that in Mr. Judson the linen draper I had to
deal with a very different person from the Rev. Jonah Goodge. He
questioned me closely as to my motive in seeking information on the
subject of the departed Haygarth, and I had some compunction in
diplomatising with him as I had diplomatised with Mr. Goodge. To
hoodwink the wary Jonah was a triumph--to deceive the confiding
linen draper was a shame. However, as I have before set down, I suppose
at the falsest I am not much farther from the truth than a barrister or
a diplomatist.
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