The gooseherd faced him in silence.
'Well,' said Mr. Curtenty again, his eyes twinkling, 'how much for the lot?'
The gooseherd gloomily and suspiciously named a sum.
Mr. Curtenty named a sum startlingly less, ending in sixpence.
'I'll tak' it,' said the gooseherd, in a tone that closed on the bargain like a vice.
The Deputy-Mayor perceived himself the owner of twelve geese and two ganders—one Brent, one Barnacle. It was a shock, but he sustained it. Involuntarily he looked at Mr. Gordon.
'How are you going to get 'em home, Curtenty?' asked Gordon, with coarse sarcasm; 'drive 'em?'
Nettled, Mr. Curtenty retorted:
'Now, then, Gas Gordon!'
The barmaid laughed aloud at this sobriquet, which that same evening was all over the town, and which has stuck ever since to the Chairman of the Gas and Lighting Committee. Mr. Gordon wished, and has never ceased to wish, either that he had been elected to some other committee, or that his name had begun with some other letter.