k again at
Dolly, and then made an ineffectual effort to extract a whiff from his
pipe, which had gone out long ago.

'Say a word, father, if it's only "how d'ye do,"' urged Joe.

'Certainly, Joseph,' answered Mr Willet. 'Oh yes! Why not?'

'To be sure,' said Joe. 'Why not?'

'Ah!' replied his father. 'Why not?' and with this remark, which he
uttered in a low voice as though he were discussing some grave question
with himself, he used the little finger--if any of his fingers can
be said to have come under that denomination--of his right hand as a
tobacco-stopper, and was silent again.

And so he sat for half an hour at least, although Dolly, in the most
endearing of manners, hoped, a dozen times, that he was not angry with
her. So he sat for half an hour, quite motionless, and looking all
the while like nothing so much as a great Dutch Pin or Skittle. At the
expiration of that period, he suddenly, and without the least notice,
burst (to the great consternation of the young people) into a very loud
and very short laugh; and repeating, 'Certainly, Joseph. Oh yes! Why
not?' went out for a walk.

Chapter 79

Old John did not walk near the Golden Key, for between the Golden Key
and the Black Lion there lay a wilderness of streets--as everybody
knows who is acquainted with the relative bearings of Clerkenwell and
Whitechapel--and he was by no means famous for pedestrian exercises.
But the Golden Key lies in our way, though it was out of his; so to the
Golden Key this chapter goes.

The Golden Key itself, fair emblem of the locksmith's trade, had been
pulled down by the rioters, and roughly trampled under foot. But, now,
it was hoisted up again in all the glory of a new coat of paint,
and shewed more bravely even than in days of yore. Indeed the whole
house-front was spruce and trim, and so freshened up throughout, that if
there yet remained at large any of the rioters who had been concerned in
the attack upon it, the sight of the old, goodly, prosperous dwelling,
so revived, must have been to them as gall and wormwood.

The shutters of the shop were closed, however, and the window-blinds
above were all pulled down, and in place of its usual cheerful
appearance, the house had a look of sadness and an air of mourning;
which the neighbours, who in old days had often seen poor Barnaby go in
and out, were at no loss to understand. The door stood partly open;
but the locksmith's hammer was unheard; the cat sat mopi