“I am not Rigges.”
“Oh, I forgot! you 're the other fellow. Well, think it over, Harpar.”
“My name is not Harpar, sir.”
“What do I care for a stray vowel or two? Maybe you call yourself Harpar, or Harper? It's all the same to us.”
“It is not the question of a vowel or two, sir; and I desire you to remark it is the graver one of a mistaken identity!” I said this with a high-sounding importance that I thought must astound him; but his light and frivolous nature was impervious to rebuke.
“We have nothing to say to that,” replied he, carelessly. “You may be Noakes or Styles. I believe they are the names of any fellows who are supposed by courtesy to have no name at all, and it's all alike to us. What I have to observe to you is this: nobody cares very much whether you are detained here or not; nobody wants to detain you. Just reflect, therefore, if it's not the best thing you can do to slope off, and make no more fuss about it?”
“Once for all, sir,” said I, still more impressively, “I am not the person against whom this charge is made. The authorities have all along mistaken me for another.”
“Well, what if they have? Does it signify one kreutzer? We have had trouble enough about the matter already, and do not embroil us any further.”
“May I ask, sir, just for information, who are the 'we' you have so frequently alluded to?”
Had I asked him in what division of the globe he understood us then to be conversing, he would not have regarded me with a look of more blank astonishment.