"Couldn't have been in it without," said Constable Applebee, chuckling at his wit. "It's the rummiest built place you ever saw. Just step in a minute. Not that you can see much of it with this fog on, but I could describe it blindfold. Six houses with the street doors in front of us--we're standing facing 'em now--and only one of 'em let, the one at the end corner, Mr. Samuel Boyd's. The others have been empty I don't know how long. Now right about face, and what do you see?"
"As fur as I can make out," said Constable Pond, peering before him, "it's a blank wall."
"It is a blank wall, the backs of six houses, without any back entrance to 'em."
"Where's the front entrance?"
"In Shore Street. If we had Samuel Boyd's money we'd do better with it, wouldn't we, Pond? We'd have a house with a bit of garden in front and a bit of garden at the back, with a rose tree or two, and flowers in the winder--because what's the use of money if you don't enjoy it?"
"That's what I say. Life's short. Only tempery."
"Temporarily, Pond, temporarily," said Constable Applebee, in correction. "You must have made a mess of it at school. My missis'd go wild with delight if she had a house like that. She's as fond of flowers as bees of honey."
"So's mine," said Constable Pond, standing up for his own like a man.
"They all are. And if I had my wish I'd never leave the house in the morning without one in my buttonhole. It mellers a man, Pond, that's what it does, it mellers him, and whether you're rough or whether you're smooth it shows you've got a good heart. I never saw Samuel Boyd with a flower in his buttonhole, and if I lived to a hundred I never should. And I never had a civil word from him."
"Nor anything in the way of a tip, I'll bet," remarked Constable Pond.