The well-known shops, however, with their cheerful lights, did something for me; and when I alighted at the door of the Gray’s Inn Coffeehouse, I had recovered my spirits. It recalled, at first, that so-different time when I had put up at the Golden Cross, and reminded me of the changes that had come to pass since then; but that was natural.
“Do you know where Mr. Traddles lives in the Inn?” I asked the waiter, as I warmed myself by the coffee room fire.
“Holborn Court, sir. Number two.”
“ Mr. Traddles has a rising reputation among the lawyers, I believe?” said I.
“Well, sir,” returned the waiter, “probably he has, sir; but I am not aware of it myself.”
This waiter, who was middle-aged and spare, looked for help to a waiter of more authority—a stout, potential old man, with a double chin, in black breeches and stockings, who came out of a place like a churchwarden’s pew, at the end of the coffee room, where he kept company with a cashbox, a Directory, a Law-list, and other books and papers.
“ Mr. Traddles,” said the spare waiter. “Number two in the Court.”
The potential waiter waved him away, and turned, gravely, to me.
“I was inquiring,” said I, “whether Mr. Traddles, at number two in the Court, has not a rising reputation among the lawyers?”
“Never heard his name,” said the waiter, in a rich husky voice.
I felt quite apologetic for Traddles.