breeches pockets?"
I inquired. "Excuse me mentioning it, but you showed yourself so
extremely nervous a moment back."

My voice was not all I could have wished, but it sufficed. I could hear
it tremble, but the landlord apparently could not. He turned away, and
drew a long breath, and you may be sure I was quick to follow his
example.

"You're a cool hand at least, and that's the sort I like," said he. "Be
what you please, I'll deal square. I'll take the chaise for a hundred
pound down, and throw the dinner in."

"I beg your pardon," I cried, wholly mystified by this form of words.

"You pay me a hundred down," he repeated, "and I'll take the chaise.
It's very little more than it cost," he added, with a grin, "and you
know you must get it off your hands somehow."

I do not know when I have been better entertained than by this impudent
proposal. It was broadly funny, and I suppose the least tempting offer
in the world. For all that, it came very welcome, for it gave me the
occasion to laugh. This I did with the most complete abandonment, till
the tears ran down my cheeks; and ever and again, as the fit abated, I
would get another view of the landlord's face, and go off into another
paroxysm.

"You droll creature, you will be the death of me yet!" I cried, drying
my eyes.

My friend was now wholly disconcerted; he knew not where to look, nor
yet what to say; and began for the first time to conceive it possible he
was mistaken.

"You seem rather to enjoy a laugh, sir," said he.

"O yes! I am quite an original," I replied, and laughed again.

Presently, in a changed voice, he offered me twenty pounds for the
chaise; I ran him up to twenty-five, and closed with the offer; indeed,
I was glad to get anything; and if I haggled, it was not in the desire
of gain, but with the view at any price of securing a safe retreat. For,
although hostilities were suspended, he was yet far from satisfied; and
I could read his continued suspicions in the cloudy eye that still
hovered about my face. At last they took shape in words.

"This is all very well," says he: "you carry it off well; but for all
that, I must do my duty."

I had my strong effect in reserve: it was to burn my ships with a
vengeance! I rose. "Leave the room," said I. "This is insufferable. Is
the man mad?" And then, as if already half-ashamed of my passion: "I can
take a joke as well as any one," I added; "but this passes measure. Send
my servant and the bil