Mr. Pecksniff looked about him for a moment, and then knocked at the door of a very dingy edifice, even among the choice collection of dingy edifices at hand; on the front of which was a little oval board, like a tea-tray, with this inscription—"Commercial Boarding House: M. Todgers."
It seemed that M. Todgers was not up yet, for Mr. Pecksniff knocked twice and rang thrice, without making any impression on anything but a dog over the way. At last a chain and some bolts were withdrawn with a rusty noise, as if the weather had made the very fastenings hoarse, and a small boy with a large red head, and no nose to speak of, and a very dirty Wellington boot on his left arm, appeared; who (being surprised) rubbed the nose just mentioned with the back of a shoe-brush, and said nothing.
"Still a-bed, my man?" asked Mr. Pecksniff.
"Still a-bed!" replied the boy. "I wish they wos still a-bed. They're very noisy a-bed; all calling for their boots at once. I thought you wos the Paper, and wondered why you didn't shove yourself through the grating as usual. What do you want?"
Considering his years, which were tender, the youth may be said to have preferred this question sternly, and in something of a defiant manner. But Mr. Pecksniff, without taking umbrage at his bearing, put a card in his hand, and bade him take that up-stairs, and show them in the meanwhile into a room where there was a fire.
"Or if there's one in the eating parlour," said Mr. Pecksniff, "I can find it myself." So he led his daughters, without waiting for any further introduction, into a room on the ground floor, where a table-cloth (rather a tight and scanty fit in reference to the table it covered) was already spread for breakfast: displaying a mighty dish of pink boiled beef; an instance of that particular style of loaf which is known to housekeepers as a slack-baked, crummy quartern; a liberal provision of cups and saucers; and the usual appendages.
Inside the fender were some half dozen pairs of shoes and boots, of various sizes, just cleaned and turned with the soles upward to dry; and a pair of short black gaiters, on one of which was chalked—in sport, it would appear, by some gentleman who had slipped down for the purpose, pending his toilet, and gone up again—"Jinkins's Particular," while the other exhibited a sketch in profile, claiming to be the portrait of Jinkins himself
M. Todgers's Commercial Boarding-House was a house of that sort which is likely to be dark at any time; but that morning it was especially dark. There was an odd smell in the passage, as if the concentrated essence of all the dinners that had been cooked in the kitchen since the house was built, lingered at the top of the kitchen stairs to that hour, and, like the Black Friar in Don Juan, "wouldn't be driven away." In particular, there was a sensation of cabbage; as if all the greens that had ever been boiled there, were evergreens, and flourished in immortal strength. The parlour was wainscoted, and communicated to strangers a magnetic and instinctive consciousness of rats and mice. The staircase was very gloomy and very broad, with balustrades so thick and
