"And you wish to get rid of me as soon as may be."
"I hope there is no impoliteness in complimenting you on your discernment."
"Your two wishes," said I, "may be reconciled. Let me cease to be your burglar, and let me continue here as your butler."
He leant back, spreading out the fingers of each hand as if the table's edge was a harpsichord, and he stretching octaves upon it.
"Believe me," I went on, "you might do worse. I have been a demy of Magdalen College, Oxford, in my time, and retain some Greek and Latin. I'll undertake to read the Fathers with an accent that shall not offend you. My knowledge of wine is none the worse for having been cultivated in other men's cellars. Moreover, you shall engage the ugliest cook in Christendom, so long as I'm your butler. I've taken a liking to you—that's flat—and I apply for the post."
"I give forty pounds a year," said he.
"And I'm cheap at that price."
He filled up his glass, looking up at me while he did so with the air of one digesting a problem. From first to last his face was grave as a judge's.
"We are too impulsive, I think," was his answer, after a minute's silence. "And your speech smacks of the amateur. You say, 'Let me cease to be your burglar, and let me be your butler.' The mere aspiration is respectable; but a man might as well say, 'Let me cease to write poems; let me paint pictures.' And truly, sir, you impressed me as no expert in your present trade, but a journeyman-housebreaker, if I may say so."
"On the other hand," I argued, "consider the moderation of my demands; that alone should convince you of my desire to turn over a new leaf. I ask for a month's trial; if, at the end of that time, I don't suit, you shall say so, and I'll march from your door with nothing in my pocket but my month's wages. Be hanged, sir! but when I reflect on the amount you'll have to pay to get me to face to-night's storm again, you seem to be getting off dirt-cheap!" cried I, slapping my palm on the table.