“It ain’t much,” said Buck, dropping Thackeray to the floor.  “I read the whole thing once.—­No, I guess I’m thinkin’ of The County Fair, a drammer that I saw at the Bee-jou.  But I guess they’re all the same, those Fairs.”

“Say Doc,” he went on presently, “I’m going to double you on Number Seven, beginning from to-morrow, hear?”

Number Seven was one of the stiffest of Klinker’s Exercises for All Parts of the Body.  Queed looked up absently.

“That’s right,” said his trainer, inexorably.  “It’s just what you need.  I had a long talk with Smithy, last night.”

“Buck,” said the Doctor, clearing his throat, “have I ever—­ahem—­told you of the famous reply of Dr. Johnson to the Billingsgate fishwives?”

“Johnson?  Who?  Fat, sandy-haired man lives on Third Street?”

“No, Dr. Samuel Johnson, the well-known English author and—­character.  It is related that on one occasion Dr. Johnson approached the fishwives at Billingsgate to purchase of their wares.  The exact details of the story are not altogether clear in my memory, but, as I recall it, something the good Doctor said angered these women, for they began showering him with profane and blasphemous names.  At this style of language the fishwives are said to be extremely proficient.  What do you fancy that Dr. Johnson called them in return?  But you could hardly guess.  He called H them parallelopipedons.  I am not entirely certain whether it was parallelopipedons or isosceles triangles.  Possibly there are two versions of the story.”

Buck stared at him, frankly and greatly bewildered, and noticed that the little Doctor was staring at him, with strong marks of anxiety on his face.

“I should perhaps say,” added Queed, “that parallelopipedons and isosceles triangles are not profane or swearing words at all.  They are, in fact, merely the designations applied to geometrical figures.”

“Oh,” said Klinker.  “Oh.”

There was a brief pause.

“Ah, well!...  Go on with what you were telling me as we walked up, then!”

“Sure thing.  But I don’t catch the conversation.  What was all that con you were giving me—?”

“Con?”

“About Johnson and the triangles.”

“It simply occurred to me to tell you a funny story, of the sort that men are known to like, with the hope of amusing you—­”

“Why, that wasn’t a funny story, Doc.”

“I assure you that it was.”

“Don’t see it,” said Klinker.

“That is not my responsibility, in any sense.”

Thus Doctor Queed, sitting stiffly on his hard little chair, and gazing with annoyance at Klinker through the iron bars at the foot of the bed.

“Blest if I pipe,” said Buck, and scratched his head.

“I cannot both tell the stories and furnish the brains to appreciate them.  Kindly proceed with what you were telling me.”