hear anything," I said reluctantly to his expectant face. He smiled
undefeated. "Try again," he said, and repeated, "Tono-Bungay."

"Oh, THAT!" I said.

"Eh?" said he.

"But what is it?"

"Ah!" said my uncle, rejoicing and expanding. "What IS it? That's
what you got to ask? What won't it be?" He dug me violently in what he
supposed to be my ribs. "George," he cried--"George, watch this place!
There's more to follow."

And that was all I could get from him.

That, I believe, was the very first time that the words Tono-Bungay ever
heard on earth--unless my uncle indulged in monologues in his chamber--a
highly probable thing. Its utterance certainly did not seem to me at the
time to mark any sort of epoch, and had I been told this word was the
Open Sesame to whatever pride and pleasure the grimy front of London hid
from us that evening, I should have laughed aloud.

"Coming now to business," I said after a pause, and with a chill sense
of effort; and I opened the question of his trust.

My uncle sighed, and leant back in his chair. "I wish I could make all
this business as clear to you as it is to me," he said. "However--Go on!
Say what you have to say."