"Why, what a dismal-minded croaker you are this morning!" exclaimed George Sheldon with unmitigated disgust; "a regular raven, by Jove! You come to a fellow's office just as matters are beginning to look like success--after ten years' plodding and ten years' disappointment--and you treat him to maudlin howls about the Court of Chancery. This is a new line you've struck out, Hawkehurst, and I can tell you it isn't a pleasant one."
"Well, no, I suppose I oughtn't to say that sort of thing," answered Valentine in an apologetic tone; "but there are some days in a man's life when there seems to be a black cloud between him and everything he looks at. I feel like that today. There's a tightening sensation about something under my waistcoat--my heart, perhaps--a sense of depression that may be either physical or mental, that I can't get rid of. If a man had walked by my side from Chelsea to Holborn whispering forebodings of evil into my ear at every step, I couldn't have felt more downhearted than I do."
"What did you eat for breakfast?" asked Mr. Sheldon impatiently. "A tough beefsteak fried by a lodging-house cook, I daresay--they _will_ fry their steaks. Don't inflict the consequences of your indigestible diet upon me. To tell me that there's a black cloud between you and everything you look at, is only a sentimental way of telling me that you're bilious. Pray be practical, and let us look at things from a business point of view. Here is Appendix A.--a copy of the registry of the marriage of Matthew Haygarth, bachelor, of Clerkenwell, in the county of Middlesex, to Mary Murchison, spinster, of Southwark, in the county of Surrey. And here is Appendix B.--a copy of the registry of the marriage between William Meynell, bachelor, of Smithfield, in the county of Middlesex, to Caroline Mary Haygarth, spinster, of Highgate, in the same county."
"You have found the entry of a second Haygarthian marriage?"
"I have. The C. of Matthew's letters is the Caroline Mary here indicated, the daughter and heiress of Matthew Haygarth--doubtless christened Caroline after her gracious majesty the consort of George II., and Mary after the Molly whose picture was found in the tulip-leaf bureau. The Meynell certificate was easy enough to find, since the letters told me that Miss C.'s suitor had a father who lived in Aldersgate-street, and a father who approved his son's choice. The Aldersgate citizen had a house of his own, and a more secure social status altogether than that poor, weak, surreptitious Matthew. It was therefore only natural that the marriage should be celebrated in the Meynell mansion. Having considered this, I had only to ransack the registers of a certain number of churches round and about Aldersgate-street in order to find what I wanted; and after about a day and a half of hard labour, I did find the invaluable document which places me one generation nearer the present, and on the high-road to the discovery of my heir-at-law. I searched the same registry for children of the aforesaid William and Caroline Mary Meynell, but could find no record of such children nor any further entry of the name of Meynell. But we must search other registries within access of Aldersgate-street before we give up the idea of finding such entries in that neighbourhood."