12.

13. And if Pitman is dishonest and don't send me to gaol, he will

want a fortune.

13.

'O, this seems to be a very one-sided business,' exclaimed Morris.

'There's not so much in this method as I was led to think.' He crumpled

the paper up and threw it down; and then, the next moment, picked it

up again and ran it over. 'It seems it's on the financial point that

my position is weakest,' he reflected. 'Is there positively no way of

raising the wind? In a vast city like this, and surrounded by all the

resources of civilization, it seems not to be conceived! Let us have

no more precipitation. Is there nothing I can sell? My collection of

signet--' But at the thought of scattering these loved treasures the

blood leaped into Morris's check. 'I would rather die!' he exclaimed,

and, cramming his hat upon his head, strode forth into the streets.

'I MUST raise funds,' he thought. 'My uncle being dead, the money in

the bank is mine, or would be mine but for the cursed injustice that has

pursued me ever since I was an orphan in a commercial academy. I know

what any other man would do; any other man in Christendom would forge;

although I don't know why I call it forging, either, when Joseph's dead,

and the funds are my own. When I think of that, when I think that my

uncle is really as dead as mutton, and that I can't prove it, my gorge

rises at the injustice of the whole affair. I used to feel bitterly

about that seven thousand eight hundred pounds; it seems a trifle now!

Dear me, why, the day before yesterday I was comparatively happy.'

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