Dark Designs.  
The lawyer was first to speak. “It strikes me I have seen you before,” he said, looking at Laidlaw with a sharp steady gaze.
 
“Ay, sir, an’ I’ve seen you before,” returned the latter with an extremely simple look. “I saw ye whan I was comin’ oot o’ the hoose o’ Mr Speevin, whar I’m lodgin’.”
 
“Oh, exactly!” returned the lawyer with a bland smile; “pray be seated, gentlemen, and let me know your business.”
 
They obeyed,—Sam Blake with an expression of stolid stupidity on his countenance, which was powerfully suggestive of a ship’s figurehead—Tommy with an air of meekness that was almost too perfect.
 
It would be tedious to detail the conversation that ensued. Suffice it to say that David said he was a Scotch farmer on a visit to London; that he possessed a good lot of spare cash, for which, at the time being, he got very small interest; that he did not understand business matters very well, but what he wanted to know was, how he should go about investing funds—in foreign railways, for instance, such as the Washab and Roria line.
 
At this point he was interrupted by Mr Lockhart who asked what had put that particular railway into his head, and was informed that the newspapers had done so by showing it to be the line whose shares produced very high dividends at that time.
 
“I’m richt I fancy?” said David.
 
“Yes, you are right, and I could easily put you in the way of investing in that railway.”
 
“Have the shares been lang at this high figure?” asked Laidlaw.
 
“Yes; they have improved steadily for several years back.”
 
“What say ye to that freend?” demanded David, turning to Sam with a triumphant look.
 
Sam turned on his friend a look as expressionless as that of a Dutch clock, and said sententiously, “I says, go in an’ win.”
 
“I says ditto!” thought Tommy Splint, but he meekly and wisely held his tongue.
 
Meanwhile the lawyer went into another room, from which, returning after a short absence, he produced a bundle of Reports which fully bore out his statement as to the flourishing condition of the Washab and Roria Railway.
 
“Weel, I’ll see aboot it,” said David, after a few moments’ consideration, with knitted brows. “In the meantime, sir, what have I to pay to you for yer information?”
 
Mr Lockhart said he had nothing to pay, and hoped he would have the pleasure of seeing him soon again.
 
“Noo, isn’t that a blagyird?” demanded Laidlaw, when they were again in the street.
 
“No doubt he is,” replied Sam; “but how will you manage to haul him up and prove that he has been swindling the old woman?”
 
“Hoo can I tell? Am I a lawyer? But I’ll fin’ oot somehoo.”
 
“Well, mate, while you are finding out,” returned the sailor, “I’ll go to Cherub Court. So, Tommy, will you go with Mr Laidlaw or with me?”
 
The boy looked first at one and then at the other with a curious “how-happy-could-I-be-with-either” expression on his sharp countenance, and then elected to accompany the sailor. On the way he told Sam of the “swell visitors” to the garret, whom Laidlaw had prevented him from going back to see.
 
“Quite right he was, Tommy, my boy,” said his friend. “It is easy to see that you have not profited as much as you might from the example and teaching of my dear Susy an’ chimney-pot Liz.”
 
“Chimley-pot,” murmured the boy, correcting him in a low tone. “Vell, you could ’ardly expect,” he added, “that a child of my age should git the profit all at once. I suppose it’s like a bad ease o’ waxination—it ha’n’t took properly yet.”
 
“Then we must have you re-vaccinated, my boy. But tell me, what were the swells like?”
 
The description of the swells occupied Tommy all the rest of the walk to Cherub Court, where they found old Liz and Susan in a state of great excitement about the visitors who had just left.
 
“Why, who d’ye think they was?” exclaimed the old woman, making the fang wobble with a degree of vigour that bid fair to unship it altogether, “it was my dear sweet little boy Jacky—”
 
“Little boy! Granny!” cried Susan, with a merry laugh.
 
“Of course, child, I mean what he was and ever will be to me. He’s a tall middle-aged gentleman now, an’ with that nice wife that used to visit us—an’ their sweet daughter—just like what the mother was, exceptin’ those hideous curls tumblin’ about her pretty brow as I detest more than I can tell. An’ she’s goin’ to be married too, young as she is, to a clergyman down in Devonshire, where the family was used to go every summer (alongside o’ their lawyer Mr Lockhart as they was so fond of, though the son as has the business now ain’t like his father); the sweet child—dear, dear, how it do call up old times!”
 
“And didn’t they,” broke in Tommy, “never say a word about ’elpin’ you, granny, to git hout of your troubles?”
 
“’Ow could they offer to ’elp me,” returned old Liz sternly, “w’en they knew nothink about my troubles? an’ I’m very glad they didn’t, for it would have spoiled their visit altogether if they’d begun it by offerin’ me assistance. For shame, Tommy. You’re not yet cured o’ greed, my dear.”
 
“Did I say I was?” replied the urchin, with a hurt look.
 
Lest the reader should entertain Tommy’s idea, we may here mention that Colonel Brentwood and his wife, knowing old Liz&............