poor little scruples.
    Since Harold would not give Jermyn access to him, that vigorous attorney was
resolved to take it. He knew all about the meeting at the White Hart, and he was
going thither with the determination of accosting Harold. He thought he knew
what he should say, and the tone in which he should say it. It would be a vague
intimation, carrying the effect of a threat, which should compel Harold to give
him a private interview. To any counter-consideration that presented itself in
his mind - to anything that an imagined voice might say - that imagined answer
arose. »That's all very fine, but I'm not going to be ruined if I can help it -
least of all, ruined in that way.« Shall we call it degeneration or gradual
development - this effect of thirty additional winters on the soft-glancing,
versifying young Jermyn?
    When Jermyn entered the room at the White Hart he did not immediately see
Harold. The door was at the extremity of the room, and the view was obstructed
by groups of gentlemen with figures broadened by overcoats. His entrance excited
no peculiar observation: several persons had come in late. Only one or two, who
knew Jermyn well, were not too much pre-occupied to have a glancing remembrance
of what had been chatted about freely the day before - Harold's irritated reply
about his agent, from the witness-box. Receiving and giving a slight nod here
and there, Jermyn pushed his way, looking round keenly, until he saw Harold
standing near the other end of the room. The solicitor who had acted for Felix
was just then speaking to him, but having put a paper into his hand turned away;
and Harold, standing isolated, though at no great distance from others, bent his
eyes on the paper. He looked brilliant that morning; his blood was flowing
prosperously. He had come in after a ride, and was additionally brightened by
rapid talk and the excitement of seeking to impress himself favourably, or at
least powerfully, on the minds of neighbours nearer or more remote. He had just
that amount of flush which indicates that life is more enjoyable than usual; and
as he stood with his left hand caressing his whisker, and his right holding the
paper and his riding-whip, his dark eyes running rapidly along the written
lines, and his lips reposing in a curve of good-humour which had more happiness
in it than a smile, all beholders might have seen that his mind was at ease.
    Jermyn walked quickly and quietly close up to him