involved material obligations unknown to Apex. Marvell, indeed, had
been loftily careless of such questions; but his grandfather, on the
announcement of the engagement, had called on Mr. Spragg and put before
him, with polished precision, the young man's financial situation.

Mr. Spragg, at the moment, had been inclined to deal with his visitor in
a spirit of indulgent irony. As he leaned back in his revolving chair,
with feet adroitly balanced against a tilted scrap basket, his air of
relaxed power made Mr. Dagonet's venerable elegance seem as harmless as
that of an ivory jack-straw--and his first replies to his visitor were
made with the mildness of a kindly giant.

"Ralph don't make a living out of the law, you say? No, it didn't strike
me he'd be likely to, from the talks I've had with him. Fact is, the
law's a business that wants--" Mr. Spragg broke off, checked by a
protest from Mr. Dagonet. "Oh, a PROFESSION, you call it? It ain't a
business?" His smile grew more indulgent as this novel distinction
dawned on him. "Why, I guess that's the whole trouble with Ralph. Nobody
expects to make money in a PROFESSION; and if you've taught him to
regard the law that way, he'd better go right into cooking-stoves and
done with it."

Mr. Dagonet, within a narrower range, had his own play of humour; and it
met Mr. Spragg's with a leap. "It's because I knew he would manage to
make cooking-stoves as unremunerative as a profession that I saved him
from so glaring a failure by putting him into the law."

The retort drew a grunt of amusement from Mr. Spragg; and the eyes of
the two men met in unexpected understanding.