, Lidderdale. I've had a very keen
sense of humour ever since I was a baby. I say, Lidderdale, you
certainly know your way about this street. I'm very much obliged to me
for meeting you. I shall get to know the street in time. You see, my
object was to get beyond the house, because I said to myself 'the house
is in Keppel Street, it can dodge about _in_ Keppel Street, but it can't
be in any other street,' so I thought that if I could dodge it into the
corner of Keppel Street--you follow what I mean? I may be talking a bit
above your head, we've been talking philosophy all the evening, but if
you concentrate you'll follow my meaning."

"Here we are," said Mark, for by this time he had persuaded Mr. Mousley
to put his foot upon the step of the front door.

"You managed the house very well," said the clergyman. "It's
extraordinary how a house will take to some people and not to others.
Now I can do anything I like with dogs, and you can do anything you like
with houses. But it's no good patting or stroking a house. You've got to
manage a house quite differently to that. You've got to keep a house's
accounts. You haven't got to keep a dog's accounts."

They were in the gymnasium by now, which by the light of Mark's small
candle loomed as vast as a church.

"Don't talk as you go upstairs," Mark admonished.

"Isn't that a dog I see there?"

"No, no, no," said Mark. "It's the horse. Come along."

"A horse?" Mousley echoed. "Well, I can manage horses too. Come here,
Dobbin. If I'd known we were going to meet a horse I should have brought
back some sugar with me. I suppose it's too late to go back and buy some
sugar now?"

"Yes, yes," said Mark impatiently. "Much too late. Come along."

"If I had a piece of sugar he'd follow us upstairs. You'll find a horse
will go anywhere after a piece of sugar. It is a horse, isn't it? Not a
donkey? Because if it was a donkey he would want a thistle, and I don't
know where I can get a thistle at this time of night. I say, did you
prod me in the stomach then with anything?" asked Mr. Mousley severely.

"No, no," said Mark. "Come along, it was the parallel bars."

"I've not been near any bars to-night, and if you are suggesting that
I've been in bars you're making an insinuation which I very much resent,
an insinuation which I resent most bitterly, an insinuation which I
should not allow anybody to make without first pointing out that it was
an insinuation."

"Do come down off tha