"Then, Mr. Lackaday----"
"You can omit the 'Mr.,'" said Andrew, "if you care to do so."
"You're more English than I thought," smiled Horatio Bakkus.
"I'm proud that you should say so," replied Andrew.
"I was about to remark," said Bakkus, "when you interrupted me, that I wondered why a young Englishman of obviously decent upbringing should be pursuing this contemptible form of livelihood."
"I beg your pardon," said Andrew, pausing in the act of conveying to his mouth a morsel of sandwich. He was puzzled; comrades down on their luck had cursed the profession for a sale métier and had wished they were road sweepers; but he had never heard it called contemptible. It was a totally new conception.
Bakkus repeated his words and added: "It is below the dignity of one made in God's image."
"I am afraid I do not agree with you," replied Andrew, stiffly. "I was born in the profession and honourably bred in it and I have known no other and do not wish to know any other."
"You were born an imitator? It seems rather a narrow scheme of life."
"I was born in a circus, and whatever there could be learned in a circus I was taught. And it was, as you have guessed, a decent upbringing. By Gum, it was!" he added, with sudden heat.