"Don't I tell ye—they floats, Joe, they floats!"
"Float!" growled Joe. "Float—where to?"
"'Ere, there, an' everywhere, Joe, I can feel 'em! They're always a-gettin' theirselves all mixed up any'ow. Oh, it's an 'orrible complaint to 'ave kidneys like mine as gets theirselves lost."
"Wish they'd lose you along with 'em!" growled Joe, shaking the dust from his handkerchief.
"Joe," said the old man, putting on his hat and blinking up at him beneath its jaunty brim, "Joe, sometimes I fair despise ye!"
"Well, despise away," nodded Joe, "only get up—stand up on them doddering old pins o' yourn."
"Not me!" declared the Old Un, "I ain't goin' to climb no more o' these perishin' stairs—no, not for you nor nobody. 'Ere I am, me lad, an' 'ere I sits till you give me a piggy-back up to the top—me bein' a pore old cove with rheumatiz. I demands it—"
"You'll what?" growled Joe, hard-breathing and indignant.
"Demand it, Joe—a pore old feller wi' kidneys—an' every other ailment as flesh is hair to—a piggy-back, Joe—a piggy-back!"
Without another word Joe stooped, and lifting the old man beneath one arm, bore him up the stairs regardless of his croaking protestations and fierce invective.