“Is that door open, Lydia? There! Take yourself off. My goodness, me! disturbing my house with such a crazy errand!” And, taking old Ketch by the shoulders, who was rather feeble and tottering, from lumbago and age, Mrs. Jenkins politely marshalled him outside, and closed the door upon him. “Insolent old fellow!” she exclaimed to her husband, to whom she went at once and related the occurrence. “I wonder what he’ll pretend he has next from you? A note of invitation, indeed!” “My dear,” said Jenkins, revolving the news, and speaking as well as his chest would allow him, “it must have been a trick played him by the young college gentlemen. We should not be too hard upon the poor old man. He’s not very agreeable or good-tempered, I’m afraid it must be allowed; but--I’d not have sent him away without a bit of supper, my dear.” “I dare say you’d not,” retorted Mrs. Jenkins. “All the world knows you are soft enough for anything. I have sent him away with a flea in his ear; that’s what I have done.” Mr. Ketch had at length come to the same conclusion: the invitation must be the work of the college gentlemen. Only fancy the unhappy man, standing outside Mrs. Jenkins’s inhospitable door! Deceived, betrayed, fainting for supper, done out of the delicious tripe and onions, he leaned against the shutters, and gave vent to a prolonged and piteous howl. It might have drawn tears from a stone. In a frame of mind that was not enviable, he turned his steps homeward, clasping his hands upon his empty stomach, and vowing the most intense vengeance upon the college boys. The occurrence naturally caused him to cast back his thoughts to that other trick--the locking him into the cloisters, in which Jenkins had been a fellow-victim--and he doubled his fists in impotent anger. “This comes of their not having been flogged for that!” he groaned. Engaged in these reflections of gall and bitterness, old Ketch gained his lodge, unlocked it, and entered. No wonder that he turned his eyes upon the cloister keys, the reminiscence being so strong within him. But, to say he turned his eyes upon the cloister keys, is a mere figure of speech. No keys were there. Ketch stood a statue transfixed, and stared as hard as the flickering blaze from his dying fire would allow him. Seizing a match-box, he struck a light and held it to the hook. The keys were _not_ there. Ketch was no conjuror, and it never occurred to him to suspect that the keys had been removed before his own departure. “How had them wicked ones got in?” he foamed. “Had they forced his winder?--had they took a skeleton key to his door?--had they come down the chimbley? They were capable of all three exploits; and the more soot they collected about ‘em in the descent, the better they’d like it. He didn’t think they’d mind a little fire. It was that insolent Bywater!--or that young villain, Tod Yorke!--or that undaunted Tom Channing!--or perhaps all three leagued together! Nothing wouldn’t tame _them_.”