As he walked along Great Marlborough Street, and through those unalluring streets which surround the Soho district, and so on to the Strand and his own lodgings, he still continued to think of some wide scheme of revenge,--of some scheme in which Mr. Scruby might be included. There had appeared something latterly in Mr. Scruby's manner to him, something of mingled impatience and familiarity, which made him feel that he had fallen in the attorney's estimation. It was not that the lawyer thought him to be less honourable, or less clever, than he had before thought him; but that the man was like a rat, and knew a falling house by the instinct that was in him. So George Vavasor cursed Mr. Scruby, and calculated some method of murdering him without detection.
The reader is not to suppose that the Member for the Chelsea Districts had, in truth, resolved to gratify his revenge by murder,--by murdering any of those persons whom he hated so vigorously. He did not, himself, think it probable that he would become a murderer. But he received some secret satisfaction in allowing his mind to dwell upon the subject, and in making those calculations. He reflected that it would not do to take off Scruby and John Grey at the same time, as it would be known that he was connected with both of them; unless, indeed, he was to take off a third person at the same time,--a third person, as to the expediency of ending whose career he made his calculations quite as often as he did in regard to any of those persons whom he cursed so often. It need hardly be explained to the reader that this third person was the sitting Member for the Chelsea Districts.

As he walked along the unalluring streets which surround Soho, to the Strand and his own lodgings, he continued to think of some wide scheme of revenge - in which Mr. Scruby might be included. Some impatience and familiarity in Mr. Scruby's manner made him feel that he had fallen in the attorney's esteem. The man was like a rat, and knew a falling house by instinct. So George Vavasor cursed Mr. Scruby, and calculated some method of murdering him without detection.
The reader is not to suppose that the Member for the Chelsea Districts had, in truth, any intention to become a murderer. But he received a secret satisfaction in allowing his mind to dwell upon the subject. He reflected that it would not do to knock off Scruby and John Grey at the same time, as it would be known that he was connected with both of them; unless, indeed, he was to kill himself too.
