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He pointed to the steps.

“Hey?” said Mr. Jope. “Yes, the cask–to be sure.”

“Wot else?” said Mr. Adams. “An’ I reckon we’d best get to work, if we’re to get it housed afore dark.”

They did so: but by the time they had the cask bestowed and trigged up, and had spiled it and inserted a tap, darkness had fallen. If they wished to explore the house farther, it would be necessary to carry candles; and somehow neither Mr. Jope nor Mr. Adams felt eager for this adventure. They were hungry, moreover. So they decided to make their way back to the great hall, and sup.

They supped by the light of a couple of candles. The repast consisted of bread and cold bacon washed down by cold rum-and-water. At Symonds’s–they gave no utterance to this reflection, but each knew it to be in the other’s mind–at Symonds’s just now there would be a boiled leg of mutton with turnips, and the rum would be hot, with a slice of lemon.

“We shall get accustomed,” said Mr. Jope with a forced air of cheerfulness.

Mr. Adams glanced over his shoulder at the statuary and answered “yes” in a loud unfaltering voice. After a short silence he arose, opened one of the windows, removed a quid from his cheek, laid it carefully on the outer sill, closed the window, and resumed his seat. Mr. Jope had pulled out a cake of tobacco, and was slicing it into small pieces with his clasp-knife.

“Goin’ to smoke?” asked Mr. Adams, with another glance at the Diana.

“It don’t hurt this ‘ere marble pavement–not like the other thing.”

“No”–Mr. Adams contemplated the pavement while he, too, drew forth and filled a pipe–“a man might play a game of checkers on it; that is, o’ course, when no one was lookin’.”

“I been thinking,” announced Mr. Jope, “over what his Reverence said about bankin’ our money.”

“How much d’ye reckon we’ve got?”

“Between us? Hundred an’ twelve pound, fourteen and six. That’s after paying for rum, barrer and oddments. We could live,” said Mr. Jope, removing his pipe from his mouth and pointing the stem at his friend in expository fashion–“we could live in this here house for more’n three years.”

“Oh!” said Mr. Adams, but without enthusiasm. “Could we now?”

“That is, if we left out the vittles.”

“But we’re not goin’ to.”

“O’ course not. Vittles for two’ll run away with a heap of it. And then there’ll be callers.”

“Callers?” Mr. Adams’s face brightened.

“Not the sort you mean. Country folk. It’s the usual thing when strangers come an’ settle in a place o’ this size. . . . But, all the same, a hundred an’ twelve pound, fourteen and six is a heap: an’ as I say, we got to think over bankin’ it. A man feels solid settin’ here with money under his belt; an’ yet between you an’ me I wouldn’t mind if it was less so, in a manner o’ speakin’.”

“Me, either.”

“I was wonderin’ what it would feel like to wake in the night an’ tell yourself that someone was rollin’ up money for you like a snowball.”

“There might be a certain amount of friskiness in that. But contrariwise, if you waked an’ told yourself the fella was runnin’ off with it, there wuldn’.”

“Shore-living folks takes that risk an’ grows accustomed to it. W’y look at the fellow in charge o’ this house.”

“Where?” asked Mr. Adams nervously.

“The landlord-fellow, I mean, up in the village. His daughter said he went to sleep every afternoon, an’ wouldn’ be waked. How could a man afford to do that if his money wasn’ rollin’ up somewhere for him? An’ the place fairly lined with barrels o’ good liquor.”

“Mightn’t liquor accumylate in the same way?” asked Mr. Adams, with sudden and lively interest.

“No, you nincom’,” began Mr. Jope–when a loud knocking on the outer door interrupted him. “Hallo!” he sank his voice. “Callers already!”