"Indeed, it has been made so hard," he goes on, "to have any idea what that party was up to in combination with others that until the loss which we all deplore I was gravelled--an expression which your ladyship, moving in the higher circles, will be so good as to consider tantamount to knocked over. Small likewise--a name by which I refer to another party, a friend of mine that your ladyship is not acquainted with--got to be so close and double-faced that at times it wasn't easy to keep one's hands off his 'ead. However, what with the exertion of my humble abilities, and what with the help of a mutual friend by the name of Mr. Tony Weevle (who is of a high aristocratic turn and has your ladyship's portrait always hanging up in his room), I have now reasons for an apprehension as to which I come to put your ladyship upon your guard. First, will your ladyship allow me to ask you whether you have had any strange visitors this morning? I don't mean fashionable visitors, but such visitors, for instance, as Miss Barbary's old servant, or as a person without the use of his lower extremities, carried upstairs similarly to a guy?"
"No!"
"Then I assure your ladyship that such visitors have been here and have been received here. Because I saw them at the door, and waited at the corner of the square till they came out, and took half an hour's turn afterwards to avoid them."

Indeed, it has been so hard to have any idea what that party was up to that I was gravelled. However, with the exertion of my humble abilities, and with the help of a friend by the name of Mr. Tony Weevle, I have now reasons for an apprehension as to which I come to put your ladyship upon your guard. First, may I ask your ladyship whether you have had any strange visitors this morning?"
"No!"
"Then I assure your ladyship that such visitors have been here, because I saw them at the door, and took time to avoid them."
