“Yes, sir,” said Burgess.

“You merit well of the republic!  The country needs you.  Here’s half a dollar.  Do your duty unflinchingly—­at the nearest bar!”

Burgess took the coin with a smirk.

“Mr. Berkley, the landlady sent word that times is hard.”

“Bless her soul!  They are hard, Burgess.  Inform her of my sentiments,” said Berkley cordially.  “Now, my hat and cane, if you please.  We’re a wonderful people, Burgess; we’ll beat our walking-sticks into bayonets if Mr. Beauregard insists on saying boo to us too many times in succession. . . .  And, Burgess?”

“Sir?”

“Now that you have waked up this morning to find yourself a hero, I think you’d better find yourself another and more spectacular master.  My heroism, for the future, is to be more or less inconspicuous; in fact, I begin the campaign by inserting my own studs and cleaning my own clothes, and keeping out of gaol; and the sooner I go where that kind of glory calls me the sooner my name will be emblazoned in the bright lexicon of youth where there’s no such word as ‘jail.’”,

“Sir?”

“In simpler and more archaic phrase, I can’t afford you, Burgess, unless I pilfer for a living.”

“I don’t eat much, sir.”

“No, you don’t eat much.”

“I could quit drinking, sir.”

“That is really touching, Burgess.  This alcohol pickled integument of yours covers a trusting heart.  But it won’t do.  Heroics in a hall bedroom cut no coupons, my poor friend.  Our paths to glory and the grave part just outside the door-sill yonder.”

“She said I could stay, sir.”

“Which she?”

“The landlady.  I’m to fetch coal and run errants and wait on table.  But you’ll get the best cuts, sir.  And after hours I can see to your clothes and linen and boots and hats, and do your errants same like the usual.”

“Now this is nearly as pathetic as our best fiction,” said Berkley; “ruined master, faithful man—­won’t leave—­starves slowly at his master’s feet—­tootle music very sneaky—­’transformation!  Burgess in heaven, blinking, puzzled, stretching one wing, reflectively scratching his halo with right hind foot.  Angel chorus.  Burgess appears to enjoy it and lights one of my best cigars——­”

“Sir?” said Burgess, very red.

Berkley swung around, levelled his walking-stick, and indicated the pit of his servant’s stomach: 

“Your face is talking now; wait till that begins to yell.  It will take more than I’m earning to fill it.”

He stood a moment, smiling, curious.  Then: 

“You’ve been as faithless a valet as any servant who ever watered wine, lost a gimcrack, or hooked a weed.  Studs, neckcloths, bootjacks, silk socks, pins, underwear—­all magically and eventually faded from my wardrobe, wafted to those silent bournes of swag that valets wot of.  What in hell do you want to stay here for now, you amusing wastrel?”