But I was rewarded: the knocker fell, and as my
boy was away with the toothache, I opened the door myself. He was the
same wheezy man I had heard below some time before; and I really seem
to have liked asthmatical people ever since--except when I became a
judge and they disturbed me in court.
"Papers!"
That is enough to say to any one who understands the situation. You
may be sure I gave them my best attention, that they were finished
promptly, and, as I hoped, in the best style. If I had required any
additional incentive to keep me to my daily task of watching, this
would have been sufficient; but I wanted none. I knew that my whole
future depended upon it, and there I was from ten in the morning till
ten at night.
My first fee was small, but it was the biggest fee I ever had. It was
10s. 6d. I was only a special pleader, and with some papers our fees
were even less; we only had to _draw_ pleadings, not to open them in
court--that comes after you are called to the Bar. Drawing them means
really drawing the points of the case for counsel, and opening them
means a gabbling epitome of them to the jury, which no jury in this
world ever yet understood or ever will.
This little matter was the forerunner of others, and by little and
little I steadily went on, earning a few shillings now and a few
shillings then, but, best of all, becoming known little by little here
and there.
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