"By Jove!" cried Haldane, dropping his knife and fork, and looking admiringly at his host, who stood on the hearth, running his fingers through his shock of white hair, his shriveled and bristling aspect making a marked contrast with his sleek and lazy cat and dog--"by Jove, you are that I call a Christian!"
"Now, look here, young man," said Mr. Growther, wrathfully, "though you are under no obligations to me, you've got no business makin' game of me and callin' me names, and I won't stand it. You've got to be civil and speak the truth while you're on my premises, whether you want to or no."
Haldane shrugged his shoulders, laughed, and made haste with his dinner, for with such a gusty and variable host he might not get a chance to finish it. As he glanced around the room, however, and saw how cosey and inviting it might be made by a little order and homelike arrangement, he determined to fix it up according to his own ideas, if he could accomplish it without actually coming to blows with the occupant.
"Who keeps house for you?" he asked.
"Didn't I tell you nobody could stand me!"
"Will you stand me for about half an hour while I fix up this room for you?"
"No!"
"What will you do if I attempt it?"
"I'll set the dog on you."
"Nothing worse?" asked Haldane, with a laughing glance at the lazy cur.
"You might take something."
An expression of sharp pain crossed the young man's face; the sunshine faded out of it utterly, and he said in a cold, constrained voice, as he rose from the table: "Oh, I forgot for a moment that I am a thief in the world's estimation."
"That last remark of mine was about equal to a kick, wasn't it?"
"A little worse."
"Ain't you used to 'em yet?"
"I ought to be."
"Why, do many speak out as plain as that?"
"They act it out just as plainly. Since you don't trust me, you had better watch me, lest I put some cord-wood in my pocket."
"What do you want to do?"
"If the world is going to insist upon it that I am a scoundrel to the end of the chapter, I want to find some deep water, and get under it," was the reckless reply.
"A-a-h! Didn't I say we respectable people and the devil was in partnership over you? He wants to get you under deep water as soon as possible, and we're all a-helpin' him along. Young man, I am afraid of you, like the rest, and it seems to me that I think more of my old duds here than of your immortal soul that the devil has almost got. But I'm goin' to spite him and myself for once. I'm goin' down town after the evenin' paper, and, instead of lockin' up, as I usually do, I shall leave you in charge. I know it's risky, and I hate to do it, but it seems to me that you ought ter have sense enough to know that if you take all I've got you would be jest that much wuss off;" and before Haldane could remonstrate or reply he took a curiously twisted and gnarled cane that resembled himself and departed.