"is determined to maintain the suit, and has employed me to carry it on for
her."

"I should very little have expected," said the dean, "that Mr. Alfred Percy
would have been employed in such a way against me."

"Still less should I have expected that I could be called upon in such a
way against you," replied Alfred. "No one can feel it more than I do. The
object of my present visit is to try whether some accommodation may not be
made, which will relieve us both from the necessity of going to law, and
may prevent me from being driven to the performance of this most painful
professional duty."

"Duty! professional duty!" repeated Buckhurst: "as if I did not understand
all those _cloak-words_, and know how easy it is to put them on and off at
pleasure!"

"To some it may be, but not to me," said Alfred, calmly.

Anger started into Buckhurst's countenance: but conscious how inefficacious
it would be, and how completely he had laid himself open, the dean
answered, "You are the best judge, sir. But I trust--though I don't pretend
to understand the honour of lawyers--I trust, as a gentleman, you will not
take advantage against me in this suit, of any thing my openness has shown
you about the parsonage."

"You trust rightly, Mr. Dean," replied Alfred, in his turn, with a look not
of anger, but of proud indignation; "you trust rightly, Mr. Dean, and as I
should have expected that one who has had opportunities of knowing me so
well ought to trust."