"The only other lodger," she now whispered in explanation, "a law-writer. The children in the lanes here say he has sold himself to the devil. I don't know what he can have done with the money. Hush!"
She appeared to mistrust that the lodger might hear her even there, and repeating "Hush!" went before us on tiptoe as though even the sound of her footsteps might reveal to him what she had said.
Passing through the shop on our way out, as we had passed through it on our way in, we found the old man storing a quantity of packets of waste-paper in a kind of well in the floor. He seemed to be working hard, with the perspiration standing on his forehead, and had a piece of chalk by him, with which, as he put each separate package or bundle down, he made a crooked mark on the panelling of the wall.
Richard and Ada, and Miss Jellyby, and the little old lady had gone by him, and I was going when he touched me on the arm to stay me, and chalked the letter J upon the wall--in a very curious manner, beginning with the end of the letter and shaping it backward. It was a capital letter, not a printed one, but just such a letter as any clerk in Messrs. Kenge and Carboy's office would have made.

"The only other lodger," she whispered in explanation, "a law-writer. The children in the lanes here say he has sold himself to the devil. Hush!" She went before us down the stairs on tiptoe.
Passing through the shop on our way out, we found the old man storing a quantity of packets of waste-paper in a kind of well in the floor. He had a piece of chalk, with which, as he put each package down, he made a crooked mark on the wall.
The others had all gone past, when he touched me on the arm to stop me, and chalked the letter J upon the wall, in a very curious manner, shaping it backward.
