llity, sir.'

'To be sure!' cried Martin. 'Why, how did you come here?'

'Right through the passage, and up the stairs, sir,' said Mark.

'How did you find me out, I mean?' asked Martin.

'Why, sir,' said Mark, 'I've passed you once or twice in the street, if
I'm not mistaken; and when I was a-looking in at the beef-and-ham shop
just now, along with a hungry sweep, as was very much calculated to make
a man jolly, sir--I see you a-buying that.'

Martin reddened as he pointed to the table, and said, somewhat hastily:

'Well! What then?'

'Why, then, sir,' said Mark, 'I made bold to foller; and as I told 'em
downstairs that you expected me, I was let up.'

'Are you charged with any message, that you told them you were
expected?' inquired Martin.

'No, sir, I an't,' said Mark. 'That was what you may call a pious fraud,
sir, that was.'

Martin cast an angry look at him; but there was something in the
fellow's merry face, and in his manner--which with all its cheerfulness
was far from being obtrusive or familiar--that quite disarmed him.
He had lived a solitary life too, for many weeks, and the voice was
pleasant in his ear.

'Tapley,' he said, 'I'll deal openly with you. From all I can judge and
from all I have heard of you through Pinch, you are not a likely kind of
fellow to have been brought here by impertinent curiosity or any other
offensive motive. Sit down. I'm glad to see you.'

'Thankee, sir,' said Mark. 'I'd as lieve stand.'

'If you don't sit down,' retorted Martin, 'I'll not talk to you.'

'Very good, sir,' observed Mark. 'Your will's a law, sir. Down it is;'
and he sat down accordingly upon the bedstead.

'Help yourself,' said Martin, handing him the only knife.

'Thankee, sir,' rejoined Mark. 'After you've done.'

'If you don't take it now, you'll not have any,' said Martin.

'Very good, sir,' rejoined Mark. 'That being your desire--now it is.'
With which reply he gravely helped himself and went on eating. Martin
having done the like for a short time in silence, said abruptly:

'What are you doing in London?'

'Nothing at all, sir,' rejoined Mark.

'How's that?' asked Martin.

'I want a place,' said Mark.

'I'm sorry for you,' said Martin.

'--To attend upon a single gentleman,' resumed Mark. 'If from the
country the more desirable. Makeshifts would be preferred. Wages no
object.'

He said this so pointedly, that Martin stopped in his eating, and said:

'If you mean me--'

'Ye