‘Really? Perhaps he was rather. But it’s all over, a long while. Old Creakle!’

‘You were brought up by an uncle, then?’ said I.

‘Of course I was!’ said Traddles. ‘The one I was always going to write to. And always didn’t, eh! Ha, ha, ha! Yes, I had an uncle then. He died soon after I left school.’

‘Indeed!’

‘Yes. He was a retired — what do you call it! — draper — cloth-merchant — and had made me his heir. But he didn’t like me when I grew up.’

‘Do you really mean that?’ said I.

He was so composed, that I fancied he must have some other meaning.