“Tony,” says he, “I can make allowances for lowness of spirits, for no man knows what it is when it does come upon a man better than I do, and no man perhaps has a better right to know it than a man who has an unrequited image imprinted on his ’eart.  But there are bounds to these things when an unoffending party is in question, and I will acknowledge to you, Tony, that I don’t think your manner on the present occasion is hospitable or quite gentlemanly.”

“This is strong language, William Guppy,” returns Mr. Weevle.

“Sir, it may be,” retorts Mr. William Guppy, “but I feel strongly when I use it.”

Mr. Weevle admits that he has been wrong and begs Mr. William Guppy to think no more about it.  Mr. William Guppy, however, having got the advantage, cannot quite release it without a little more injured remonstrance.

“No!  Dash it, Tony,” says that gentleman, “you really ought to be careful how you wound the feelings of a man who has an unrequited image imprinted on his ’eart and who is not altogether happy in those chords which vibrate to the tenderest emotions.  You, Tony, possess in yourself all that is calculated to charm the eye and allure the taste.  It is not—­happily for you, perhaps, and I may wish that I could say the same—­it is not your character to hover around one flower.  The ole garden is open to you, and your airy pinions carry you through it.  Still, Tony, far be it from me, I am sure, to wound even your feelings without a cause!”

Tony again entreats that the subject may be no longer pursued, saying emphatically, “William Guppy, drop it!” Mr. Guppy acquiesces, with the reply, “I never should have taken it up, Tony, of my own accord.”

“And now,” says Tony, stirring the fire, “touching this same bundle of letters.  Isn’t it an extraordinary thing of Krook to have appointed twelve o’clock to-night to hand ’em over to me?”

“Very.  What did he do it for?”

“What does he do anything for?  He don’t know.  Said to-day was his birthday and he’d hand ’em over to-night at twelve o’clock.  He’ll have drunk himself blind by that time.  He has been at it all day.”

“He hasn’t forgotten the appointment, I hope?”

“Forgotten?  Trust him for that.  He never forgets anything.  I saw him to-night, about eight—­helped him to shut up his shop—­and he had got the letters then in his hairy cap.  He pulled it off and showed ’em me.  When the shop was closed, he took them out of his cap, hung his cap on the chair-back, and stood turning them over before the fire.  I heard him a little while afterwards, through the floor here, humming like the wind, the only song he knows—­ about Bibo, and old Charon, and Bibo being drunk when he died, or something or other.  He has been as quiet since as an old rat asleep in his hole.”

“And you are to go down at twelve?”

“At twelve.  And as I tell you, when you came it seemed to me a hundred.”