“You’ll excuse me if I wander,” returned Venus; “I am sometimes rather subject to it. I like my art, and I know how to exercise my art, and I mean to have the keeping of this document.”

“But what has that got to do with your art, partner?” asked Wegg, in an insinuating tone.

Mr. Venus winked his chronically-fatigued eyes both at once, and adjusting the kettle on the fire, remarked to himself, in a hollow voice, “She’ll bile in a couple of minutes.”

Silas Wegg glanced at the kettle, glanced at the shelves, glanced at the French gentleman behind the door, and shrank a little as he glanced at Mr. Venus winking his red eyes, and feeling in his waistcoat pocket⁠—as for a lancet, say⁠—with his unoccupied hand. He and Venus were necessarily seated close together, as each held a corner of the document, which was but a common sheet of paper.