ster George; but I shall day by day get over the objection that
I'm too old, and so I shan't be capable of seeing much improvement in
you."

The retort so tickled Joey Ladle that he grunted forth a laugh and
delivered it again, grunting forth another laugh after the second edition
of "improvement in you."

"But what's no laughing matter, Master George," he resumed, straightening
his back once more, "is, that young Master Wilding has gone and changed
the luck. Mark my words. He has changed the luck, and he'll find it
out. _I_ ain't been down here all my life for nothing! _I_ know by what
I notices down here, when it's a-going to rain, when it's a-going to hold
up, when it's a-going to blow, when it's a-going to be calm. _I_ know,
by what I notices down here, when the luck's changed, quite as well."

"Has this growth on the roof anything to do with your divination?" asked
Vendale, holding his light towards a gloomy ragged growth of dark fungus,
pendent from the arches with a very disagreeable and repellent effect.
"We are famous for this growth in this vault, aren't we?"

"We are Master George," replied Joey Ladle, moving a step or two away,
"and if you'll be advised by me, you'll let it alone."

Taking up the rod just now laid across the two casks, and faintly moving
the languid fungus with it, Vendale asked, "Ay, indeed? Why so?"

"Why, not so much because it rises from the casks of wine, and may leave
you to judge what sort of stuff a Cellarman takes into himself when he
walks in the same all the days of his life, nor yet so much because at a
stage of its growth it's maggots, and you'll fetch 'em down upon you,"
returned Joey Ladle, still keeping away, "as for another reason, Master
George."

"What other reason?"

"(I wouldn't keep on touchin' it, if I was you, sir.) I'll tell you if
you'll come out of the place. First, take a look at its colour, Master
George."

"I am doing so."

"Done, sir. Now, come out of the place."

He moved away with his light, and Vendale followed with his. When
Vendale came up with him, and they were going back together, Vendale,
eyeing him as they walked through the arches, said: "Well, Joey? The
colour."

"Is it like clotted blood, Master George?"

"Like enough, perhaps."

"More than enough, I think," muttered Joey Ladle, shaking his head
solemnly.

"Well, say it is like; say it is exactly like. What then?"

"Master George, they do say--"

"Who?"

"How sh