(“Good Lord!” said Prout, “but this _is_ King.” “Line for line, letter for letter; listen;” said little Hartopp.) “But to say that you stink, as certain lewd fellows of the baser sort aver, is to say nothing--less than nothing. In the absence of your beloved house-master, for whom no one has a higher regard than myself, I will, if you will allow me, explain the grossness--the unparalleled enormity--the appalling fetor of the stenches (I believe in the good old Anglo-Saxon word), stenches, sir, with which you have seen fit to infect your house... Oh, bother! I’ve forgotten the rest, but it was very beautiful. Aren’t you grateful to us for laborin’ with you this way, Rattray? Lots of chaps ’ud never have taken the trouble, but we’re grateful, Rattray.” “Yes, we’re horrid grateful,” grunted McTurk. “We don’t forget that soap. We’re polite. Why ain’t you polite, Rat?” “Hallo!” Stalky cantered up, his cap over one eye. “Exhortin’ the Whiffers, eh? I’m afraid they’re too far gone to repent. Rattray! White! Perowne! Malpas! No answer. This is distressin’. This is truly distressin’. Bring out your dead, you glandered lepers!” “You think yourself funny, don’t you?” said Rattray, stung from his dignity by this last. “It’s only a rat or something under the floor. We’re going to have it up to-morrow.” “Don’t try to shuffle it off on a poor dumb animal, and dead, too. I loathe prevarication. ’Pon my soul, Rattray--” “Hold on. The Hartoffles never said ’Pon my soul’ in all his little life,” said Beetle critically. (“Ah!” said Prout to little Hartopp.) “Upon my word, sir, upon my word, sir, I expected better things of you, Rattray. Why can you not own up to your misdeeds like a man? Have _I_ ever shown any lack of confidence in _you_?” (“It’s not brutality,” murmured little Hartopp, as though answering a question no one had asked. “It’s boy; only boy.”) “And this was the house,” Stalky changed from a pecking, fluttering voice to tragic earnestness. “This was the--the--open cesspit that dared to call us ‘stinkers.’ And now--and now, it tries to shelter itself behind a dead rat. You annoy me, Rattray. You disgust me! You irritate me unspeakably! Thank Heaven, I am a man of equable temper--” (“This is to your address, Macrea,” said Prout. “I fear so, I fear so.”) “Or I should scarcely be able to contain myself before your mocking visage.” “_Cavé_!” in an undertone. Beetle had spied King sailing down the corridor. “And what may you be doing here, my little friends?” the house-master began. “I had a fleeting notion--correct me if I am wrong” (the listeners with one accord choked)--“that if I found you outside my house I should visit you with dire pains and penalties.” “We were just goin’ for a walk, sir,” said Beetle. “And you stopped to speak to Rattray _en route_?” “Yes, sir. We’ve been throwing golf-balls,” said Rattray, coming out of the study.