He had at first refused altogether to have anything to do with the unravelling, and had desired that some other lawyer might be employed.
But it had gradually come to pass that he had entered heart and soul into the case, and, with many execrations on his own part against Mr.
Scarborough, could find a real interest in nothing else.

He had begun his investigations with a thorough wish to discover that Mountjoy Scarborough was, in truth, the heir.

Though he had never loved the young man, and, as he went on with his investigations, became aware that the whole property would go to the creditors should he succeed in proving that Mountjoy was the heir, yet for the sake of abstract honesty he was most anxious that it should be so.

And he could not bear to think that he and other lawyers had been taken in by the wily craft of such a man as the Squire of Tretton.

It went thoroughly against the grain with him to have to acknowledge that the estate would become the property of Augustus.