CONCERNING THE DUTY OF FATHERS; MORE ESPECIALLY THE VISCOUNT'S "ROMAN"
It was about two o'clock in the afternoon that Barnabas knocked at the door of the Viscount's chambers in Half-moon Street and was duly admitted by a dignified, albeit somewhat mournful gentleman in blue and silver, who, after a moment of sighing hesitancy, ushered him into a small reception room where sat a bullet-headed man with one eye and a remarkably bristly chin, a sinister looking person who stared very hard with his one eye, and sucked very hard, with much apparent relish and gusto, at the knob of the stick he carried. At sight of this man the mournful gentleman averted his head, and vented a sound which, despite his impressive dignity, greatly resembled a sniff, and, bowing to Barnabas, betook himself upstairs to announce the visitor. Hereupon the one-eyed man having surveyed Barnabas from head to foot with his solitary orb, drew the knob of his stick from his mouth, dried it upon his sleeve, looked at it, gave it a final rub, and spoke.
"Sir," said he in a jovial voice that belied his sinister aspect, "did you 'ear that rainbow sniff?"
"Rainbow?" said Barnabas.
"Well,—wallet, then,—footman—the ornamental cove as jest popped you in 'ere. Makes one 'undred and eleven of 'em!"
"One hundred and eleven what?"
"Sniffs, sir,—s-n-i-double-f-s! I've took the trouble to count 'em, —nothing else to do. I ain't got a word out of 'im yet, an' I've been sittin' 'ere ever since eight o'clock s'mornin'. I'm a conwivial cock, I am,—a sociable cove, yes, sir, a s-o-s-h-able cove as ever wore a pair o' boots. Wot I sez is,—though a bum, why not a sociable bum, and try to make things nice and pleasant, and I does my best, give you my word! But Lord! all my efforts is wasted on that 'ere rainbow—nothing but sniffs!"
"Why then—who—what are you?"
"I'm Perks and Condy, wines and sperrits,—eighty-five pound, eighteen, three—that's me, sir."
"Do you mean that you are—in possession—here?"