"Little idiot!" muttered Meeson; "I'll give him the sack, too, if he
isn't more careful. By Jove! why should I not have my own resident
solicitor? I could get a sharp hand with a damaged character for about
£300 a year, and I pay that old Todd quite £2000. There is a vacant place
in the Hutches that I could turn into an office. Hang me, if I don't do
it. I will make that little chirping grasshopper jump to some purpose,
I'll warrant," and he chuckled at the idea.

Just then Mr. Todd returned with the will, and before he could begin to
make any explanations his employer, cut him short with a sharp order to
read the gist of it.

This the lawyer proceeded to do. It was very short, and, with the
exception of a few legacies, amounting in all to about twenty thousand
pounds, bequeathed all the testator's vast fortune and estates, including
his (by far the largest) interest in the great publishing house, and his
palace with the paintings and other valuable contents, known as Pompadour
Hall, to his nephew, Eustace H. Meeson.

"Very well," he said, when the reading was finished; "now give it to me."

Mr. Todd obeyed, and handed the document to his patron, who deliberately
rent it into fragments with his strong fingers, and then completed its
destruction by tearing it with his big white teeth. This done, he mixed
the little pieces up, threw them on the floor, and stamped upon them with
an air of malignity that almost frightened jerky little Mr. Todd.

"Now then," he grimly said, "there's an end of the old love; so let's on
with the new. Take your pen and receive my instructions for my will."