Mr. Vholes said, “Very much so.”
“And a very important document, Mr. Vholes,” said Mr. Kenge.
Again Mr. Vholes said, “Very much so.”
“And as you say, Mr. Vholes, when the cause is in the paper next term, this document will be an unexpected and interesting feature in it,” said Mr. Kenge, looking loftily at my guardian.
Mr. Vholes was gratified, as a smaller practitioner striving to keep respectable, to be confirmed in any opinion of his own by such an authority.
“And when,” asked my guardian, rising after a pause, during which Mr. Kenge had rattled his money and Mr. Vholes had picked his pimples, “when is next term?”
“Next term, Mr. Jarndyce, will be next month,” said Mr. Kenge. “Of course we shall at once proceed to do what is necessary with this document and to collect the necessary evidence concerning it; and of course you will receive our usual notification of the cause being in the paper.”
“To which I shall pay, of course, my usual attention.”
“Still bent, my dear sir,” said Mr. Kenge, showing us through the outer office to the door, “still bent, even with your enlarged mind, on echoing a popular prejudice? We are a prosperous community, Mr. Jarndyce, a very prosperous community. We are a great country, Mr. Jarndyce, we are a very great country. This is a great system, Mr. Jarndyce, and would you wish a great country to have a little system? Now, really, really!”
He said this at the stairhead, gently moving his right hand as if it were a silver trowel with which to spread the cement of his words on the structure of the system and consolidate it for a thousand ages.