'I knowed you'd want a room for yourself, bless you!' said
Mr. Roker. 'Let me see. You'll want some furniture. You'll hire
that of me, I suppose? That's the reg'lar thing.'
'With great pleasure,' replied Mr. Pickwick.
'There's a capital room up in the coffee-room flight, that
belongs to a Chancery prisoner,' said Mr. Roker. 'It'll stand you
in a pound a week. I suppose you don't mind that?'
'Not at all,' said Mr. Pickwick.
'Just step there with me,' said Roker, taking up his hat with
great alacrity; 'the matter's settled in five minutes. Lord! why
didn't you say at first that you was willing to come down handsome?'
The matter was soon arranged, as the turnkey had foretold.
The Chancery prisoner had been there long enough to have lost
his friends, fortune, home, and happiness, and to have acquired
the right of having a room to himself. As he laboured, however,
under the inconvenience of often wanting a morsel of bread, he
eagerly listened to Mr. Pickwick's proposal to rent the apartment,
and readily covenanted and agreed to yield him up the sole and
undisturbed possession thereof, in consideration of the weekly
payment of twenty shillings; from which fund he furthermore
contracted to pay out any person or persons that might be
chummed upon it.
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