Bleak House by Charles Dickens Chapter 54 Page 3

have kept you waiting, officer, but I am rather later than my usual hour this morning. I am not well. The agitation and the indignation from which I have recently suffered have been too much for me. I am subject to — gout" — Sir Leicester was going to say indisposition and would have said it to anybody else, but Mr. Bucket palpably knows all about it — "and recent circumstances have brought it on."

As he takes his seat with some difficulty and with an air of pain, Mr. Bucket draws a little nearer, standing with one of his large hands on the library-table.

"I am not aware, officer," Sir Leicester observes; raising his eyes to his face, "whether you wish us to be alone, but that is entirely as you please. If you do, well and good. If not, Miss Dedlock would be interested —