The house, a three-story brick, seemed to have that architectural disease which is a perpetual epidemic among the tenant-houses of the city, and which makes them look as if they had all been dipped in a strong solution of something that had taken the skin off. The paint was blistered and peeling off in flakes; the blinds were hanging cornerwise by solitary hinges; the shingles were starting from their places with a strange air of disquietude, as if some mighty hand had stroked them the wrong way; the door-steps were shaky and crazy in the knees; the door itself had a curious air of debility and emaciation, and the bell-knob was too weak to return to its place after it had feebly done its brazen duty. There was no door-plate, but on a battered tin sign was blazoned, in fat letters, the mystic word “Widger.” The Cash Customer rang the bell, not once merely, or twice, but continuously, in pursuance of a dogma which he laid down as follows: “It is a mistake to ever stop ringing till somebody comes. The feebler you ring, the more the servants think you’re a dun, and therefore the more they don’t come to let you in—but if you keep it up regularly they’ll think you’re a rich relation and will rush to the rescue.” So he kept on, and the voice of the bell sharply clattered through the dismal old house, making as much noise as if it suddenly wakened a thousand echoes that had been locked up there for many years without the power to speak till now. If a timid ring denotes a dun, and a boisterous one a rich relation, then must the inhabitants of that cleanly suburb have been convinced that the present performer on the bell not only had no claims as a creditor on the people of the house, but was a rich California uncle, come to give each adult member of that happy family a gold mine or so, and to distribute a cart-load of diamonds among the children. The door at last was opened by an uncertain old man with very weak eyes, who appeared to have, in a milder form, the same malady which afflicted the house; perhaps he was a twin, and suffered from brotherly sympathy—at any rate the dilapidating disease had touched him sorely; its ravages were particularly noticeable in the toes of his boots and the elbows of his coat. Violent remedies had evidently been applied in the latter case, but the patches were of different colors, and suggestive of the rag-bag; the boots were past hope of convalescence; his shirt-collar was sunk under a greasy billow of a neckcloth, and only one slender string was visible to show where it had gone down; the nether garment was a ragged wreck, that set a hundred tattered sails to every breeze, but was anchored fast at the shoulder with a single disreputable suspender. Guided by this equivocal individual the two visitors entered a small shabbily furnished room, and bestowed themselves in a couple of treacherous chairs, in pursuance of an imbecile invitation from the battered old gentleman.