There had been an ease in this, an absence of that delay which generally took place between the expression of his desire for money and the acquisition of it,--and this had gratified him.

But he was already beginning to think that he might pay too dearly for that gratification.

At the present moment, too, Mr Melmotte was odious to him for another reason.

He had condescended to ask Mr Melmotte to make him a director of the South Central Pacific and Mexican Railway, and he,--Adolphus Longestaffe of Caversham,--had had his request refused! Mr Longestaffe had condescended very low.

'You have made Lord Alfred Grendall one!' he had said in a complaining tone.