One day he met by appointment the owner of a small block, of which
he contemplated the purchase. They were in a dreadfully dilapidated
condition, a shame that belonged more to the owner than the
inhabitants. The man wanted to sell the houses, or at least was
willing to sell them, but put an exorbitant price upon them.
Falconer expostulated.
'I know the whole of the rent these houses could bring you in,' he
said, 'without making any deduction for vacancies and defalcations:
what you ask is twice as much as they would fetch if the full rent
were certain.'
The poor wretch looked up at him with the leer of a ghoul. He was
dressed like a broken-down clergyman, in rusty black, with a
neck-cloth of whitey-brown.
'I admit it,' he said in good English, and a rather educated tone.
'Your arguments are indisputable. I confess besides that so far
short does the yield come of the amount on paper, that it would pay
me to give them away. But it's the funerals, sir, that make it
worth my while. I'm an undertaker, as you may judge from my
costume. I count back-rent in the burying. People may cheat their
landlord, but they can't cheat the undertaker. They must be buried.
That's the one indispensable--ain't it, sir?'
Falconer had let him run on that he might have the measure of him.
Now he was prepared with his reply.
'You've told me your profession,' he said: 'I'll tell you mine. I
am a lawyer. If you don't let me have those houses for five
hundred, which is the full market value, I'll prosecute you.
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