Chapter 60 - Page 2

Ralph suppressed the indignation which the schoolmaster's altered
and insolent manner awakened, and asked again why he had not sent to
him.

'What should I get by sending to you?' returned Squeers. 'To be
known to be in with you wouldn't do me a deal of good, and they
won't take bail till they know something more of the case, so here
am I hard and fast: and there are you, loose and comfortable.'

'And so must you be in a few days,' retorted Ralph, with affected
good-humour. 'They can't hurt you, man.'

'Why, I suppose they can't do much to me, if I explain how it was
that I got into the good company of that there ca-daverous old
Slider,' replied Squeers viciously, 'who I wish was dead and buried,
and resurrected and dissected, and hung upon wires in a anatomical
museum, before ever I'd had anything to do with her. This is what
him with the powdered head says this morning, in so many words:
"Prisoner! As you have been found in company with this woman; as
you were detected in possession of this document; as you were
engaged with her in fraudulently destroying others, and can give no
satisfactory account of yourself; I shall remand you for a week, in
order that inquiries may be made, and evidence got. And meanwhile I
can't take any bail for your appearance." Well then, what I say now
is, that I CAN give a satisfactory account of myself; I can hand in
the card of my establishment and say, "I am the Wackford Squeers as
is therein named, sir. I am the man as is guaranteed, by
unimpeachable references, to be a out-and-outer in morals and
uprightness of principle. Whatever is wrong in this business is no
fault of mine. I had no evil design in it, sir. I was not aware
that anything was wrong. I was merely employed by a friend, my
friend Mr Ralph Nickleby, of Golden Square. Send for him, sir, and
ask him what he has to say; he's the man; not me!"'

'What document was it that you had?' asked Ralph, evading, for the
moment, the point just raised.

'What document? Why, THE document,' replied Squeers. 'The Madeline
What's-her-name one. It was a will; that's what it was.'

'Of what nature, whose will, when dated, how benefiting her, to what
extent?' asked Ralph hurriedly.

'A will in her favour; that's all I know,' rejoined Squeers, 'and
that's more than you'd have known, if you'd had them bellows on your
head. It's all owing to your precious caution that they got hold of
it. If you had let me burn it, and taken my word that it was gone,
it would have been a heap of ashes behind the fire, instead of being
whole and sound, inside of my great-coat.'

'Beaten at every point!' muttered Ralph.

'Ah!' sighed Squeers, who, between the brandy and water and his
broken head,