"I can bear testimony to the same effect," put in Mr. Brief, who was two weeks in arrears, and anxious to conciliate his landlady.
"Testimony to the effect that Mr. Pedagog sang comic songs in the early morning?" said the Idiot. "Nonsense! I don't believe it. I have lived in this house for two years with Mr. Pedagog, and I've never heard him raise his voice in song yet."
"I didn't mean anything of the sort," retorted Mr. Brief. "You know I didn't."
"Don't apologize to me," said the Idiot. "Apologize to Mr. Pedagog. He is the man you have wronged."
"What did he say?" put in Mr. Pedagog, with a stern look at Mr. Brief. "I didn't hear what he said."
"I didn't say anything," said the lawyer, "except that I could bear testimony to the effect that your experience with flat life was similar to mine. This young person, with his customary nerve, tries to make it appear that I said you sang comic songs in the early morning."
"I try to do nothing of the sort," said the Idiot. "I simply expressed my belief that in spite of what you said Mr. Pedagog was innocent, and I do so because my experience with him has taught me that he is not the kind of man who would do that sort of thing. He has neither time, voice, nor inclination. He has an ear—two of them, in fact—and an impressionable mind, but—"
"Oh, tutt!" interrupted the School-Master. "When I need a defender, you may spare yourself the trouble of flying to my rescue."
"I know I may," said the Idiot, "but with me it's a question of can and can't. I'm willing to attack you personally, but while I live no other shall do so. Wherefore I tell Mr. Brief plainly, and to his face, that if he says you ever sang a comic song he says what is not so. You might hum one, but sing it—never!"
"We were talking of flats, I believe," said Mr. Whitechoker.