[Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens]@TWC D-Link book
Our Mutual Friend

CHAPTER 5
28/31

'I generally do it on gin and water.' 'Keeps the organ moist, does it, Wegg ?' asked Mr Boffin, with innocent eagerness.
'N-no, sir,' replied Wegg, coolly, 'I should hardly describe it so, sir.
I should say, mellers it.

Mellers it, is the word I should employ, Mr Boffin.' His wooden conceit and craft kept exact pace with the delighted expectation of his victim.

The visions rising before his mercenary mind, of the many ways in which this connexion was to be turned to account, never obscured the foremost idea natural to a dull overreaching man, that he must not make himself too cheap.
Mrs Boffin's Fashion, as a less inexorable deity than the idol usually worshipped under that name, did not forbid her mixing for her literary guest, or asking if he found the result to his liking.

On his returning a gracious answer and taking his place at the literary settle, Mr Boffin began to compose himself as a listener, at the opposite settle, with exultant eyes.
'Sorry to deprive you of a pipe, Wegg,' he said, filling his own, 'but you can't do both together.

Oh! and another thing I forgot to name! When you come in here of an evening, and look round you, and notice anything on a shelf that happens to catch your fancy, mention it.' Wegg, who had been going to put on his spectacles, immediately laid them down, with the sprightly observation: 'You read my thoughts, sir.


<<Back  Index  Next>>

D-Link book Top

TWC mobile books