As he talked, Mr. Critz replaced the shells and the rubber heel and the rubber pea and the gold-brick on the washstand. He was a plump little man with a shiny bald head and a white goatee. As he talked, he bent his head down, so that he might look above the glasses of his spectacles; and in spite of his pretended anger he looked like nothing so much as a kindly, benevolent old gentleman--the sort of old gentleman that keeps a small store in a small village and sells writing-paper that smells of soap, and candy sticks out of a glass jar with a glass cover. "How'd I know but what you was a detective?" he asked, in a gentler tone. "I am," said Mr. Gubb soberly, seating himself on one of the two beds. "I'm putty near a deteckative, as you might say." "Ding it all!" said Mr. Critz. "Now I got to go and hunt another room. I can't room with no detective." "Well, now, Mr. Critz," said Mr. Gubb, "I don't want you should feel that way." "Knowin' you are a detective makes me all nervous," complained Mr. Critz; "and a man in my business has to have a steady hand, don't he?" "You ain't told me what your business is," said Mr. Gubb. "You needn't pretend you don't know," said Mr. Critz. "Any detective that saw that stuff on the washstand would know." "Well, of course," said Mr. Gubb, "I ain't a full deteckative yet. You can't look for me to guess things as quick as a full deteckative would. Of course that brick sort of looks like a gold-brick--" "It _is_ a gold-brick," said Mr. Critz. "Yes," said Mr. Gubb. "But--I don't mean no offense, Mr. Critz--from the way you look--I sort of thought--well, that it was a gold-brick you'd bought." Mr. Critz turned very red. "Well, what if I did buy it?" he said. "That ain't any reason I can't sell it, is it? Just because a man buys eggs once--or twice--ain't any reason he shouldn't go into the business of egg-selling, is it? Just because I've bought one or two gold-bricks in my day ain't any reason I shouldn't go to sellin' 'em, is it?" Mr. Gubb stared at Mr. Critz with unconcealed surprise. "You ain't,--you ain't a con' man, are you, Mr. Critz?" he asked. "If I ain't yet, that's no sign I ain't goin' to be," said Mr. Critz firmly. "One man has as good a right to try his hand at it as another, especially when a man has had my experience in it. Mr. Gubb, there ain't hardly a con' game I ain't been conned with. I been confidenced long enough; from now on I'm goin' to confidence other folks. That's what I'm goin' to do; and I won't be bothered by no detective livin' in the same room with me. Detectives and con' men don't mix noways! No, sir!"