"Echo answered,--where?"

Those noble gentlemen, having a natural dislike to be confronted with so
low a person as Mr. Bill Troutling, had, the instant public interest was
directed from them, silently disappeared from a scene where their rank in
life seemed so little regarded. If, reader, you should be anxious to
learn from what part of the world the transitory visitants appeared, know
that they were spirits sent by that inimitable magician, Long Ned, partly
to report how matters fared in the court; for Mr. Pepper, in pursuance of
that old policy which teaches that the nearer the fox is to the hunters,
the more chance he has of being overlooked, had, immediately on his
abrupt departure from Paul, dived into a house in the very street where
his ingenuity had displayed itself, and in which oysters and ale nightly
allured and regaled an assembly that, to speak impartially, was more
numerous than select. There had he learned how a pickpocket had been
seized for unlawful affection to another man's watch; and there, while he
quietly seasoned his oysters, had he, with his characteristic acuteness,
satisfied his mind by the conviction that that arrested unfortunate was
no other than Paul. Partly, therefore, as a precaution for his own
safety, that he might receive early intelligence should Paul's defence
make a change of residence expedient, and partly (out of the friendliness
of fellowship) to back his companion with such aid as the favourable
testimony of two well-dressed persons, little known "about town," might
confer, he had despatched those celestial beings who had appeared under
the mortal names of Eustace Fitzherbert and William Howard Russell to the
imperial court of Justice Burnflat. Having thus accounted for the
apparition (the _disapparition_ requires no commentary) of Paul's
"friends," we return to Paul himself.