monkish refectory; some said, of a chapel; some said, of a Pagan temple.
It was all one now. Let who would make what he liked of a crumbled
pillar and a broken arch or so. Old Time had made what _he_ liked of it,
and was quite indifferent to contradiction.

The close air, the musty smell, and the thunderous rumbling in the
streets above, as being, out of the routine of ordinary life, went well
enough with the picture of pretty Marguerite holding her own against
those two. So Vendale went on until, at a turning in the vaults, he saw
a light like the light he carried.

"O! You are here, are you, Joey?"

"Oughtn't it rather to go, 'O! _You're_ here, are you, Master George?'
For it's my business to be here. But it ain't yourn."

"Don't grumble, Joey."

"O! _I_ don't grumble," returned the Cellarman. "If anything grumbles,
it's what I've took in through the pores; it ain't me. Have a care as
something in you don't begin a grumbling, Master George. Stop here long
enough for the wapours to work, and they'll be at it."

His present occupation consisted of poking his head into the bins, making
measurements and mental calculations, and entering them in a rhinoceros-
hide-looking note-book, like a piece of himself.

"They'll be at it," he resumed, laying the wooden rod that he measured
with across two casks, entering his last calculation, and straightening
his back, "trust 'em! And so you've regularly come into the business,