e others cried out in one voice, the burnisher exclaiming:
"I can't help _that_, this has got to be done first," while his wife
protested that she couldn't naturally stand dirt, adding, "This all was
to be done to our satisfaction, and we ain't satisfied yet by a long
shot." Delighted at this excitement, the little boy forgot to eat into
his bread and butter, rolling his eyes wildly from one to the other,
still silent.

Meanwhile, without replying, Vandover had gone down upon the floor
again, poking about amid the filth under the sink. The four others, the
burnisher, his wife, his sister-in-law and his little boy, stood about
in a half-circle behind him, seeing to it that he did the work properly,
giving orders as to how he should proceed.

"Now, be sure you get everything out that's under there," said the
burnisher. "Ouf! how it smells! They made a regular dump heap of it."

"What's that over in the corner there?" cried the wife, bending down. "I
can't see, it's so dark under there--something gray; can't you see, in
under there? You'll have to crawl way in to get at it--go way in!"
Vandover obeyed. The sink pipes were so close above him that he was
obliged to crouch lower and lower; at length he lay flat upon his
stomach. Prone in the filth under the sink, in the sour water, the
grease, the refuse, he groped about with his hand searching for the
something gray that the burnisher's wife had seen. He found it and drew
it out. It was an old hambone covered with a greenish fuzz.

"Oh, did you _ever_!" cried the burnisher, holding up his hands. "Here,
don't drop that on my clean floor; put it in your pail. Now get out the
rest of the dirt, and hurry up, it's late." Vandover crawled back, half
the way under the sink again, this time bringing out a rusty pan half
full of some kind of congealed gravy that exhaled a choking, acrid
odour; next it was an old stocking, and then an ink bottle, a broken
rat-trap, a battered teapot lacking a nozzle, a piece of rubber hose, an
old comb choked with a great handful of hair, a torn overshoe,
newspapers, and a great quantity of other debris that had accumulated
there during the occupancy of the previous tenant.

"Now go over the floor with a rag," ordered the little burnisher, when
the last of these articles had been brought out. "Wipe up all that nasty
muck! Look there by your knee to your left! Scrub that big spot there
with your brush--looks like grease. That's the style--scrub it