"She got engaged
to him the day before yesterday."
CHAPTER NINE
The offices of the old-established firm of Marlowe, Thorpe, Prescott,
Winslow and Appleby are in Ridgeway's Inn, not far from Fleet Street.
If you are a millionaire beset by blackmailers or anyone else to whose
comfort the best legal advice is essential, and have decided to put
your affairs in the hands of the ablest and discreetest firm in London,
you proceed through a dark and grimy entry and up a dark and grimy
flight of stairs; and, having felt your way along a dark and grimy
passage, you come at length to a dark and grimy door. There is plenty
of dirt in other parts of Ridgeway's Inn, but nowhere is it so
plentiful, so rich in alluvial deposits, as on the exterior of the
offices of Marlowe, Thorpe, Prescott, Winslow and Appleby. As you tap
on the topmost of the geological strata concealing the ground-glass of
the door, a sense of relief and security floods your being. For in
London grubbiness is the gauge of a lawyer's respectability.
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