Mark Twain: The Innocents Abroad

57. CHAPTER LVII. (continued)

"Where are you going with that lamp?"

"Fifteen wants it, sir."

"Fifteen! why he's got a double lot of candles--does the man want to illuminate the house?--does he want to get up a torch-light procession?--what is he up to, any how?"

"He don't like them candles--says he wants a lamp."

"Why what in the nation does----why I never heard of such a thing? What on earth can he want with that lamp?"

"Well, he only wants to read--that's what he says."

"Wants to read, does he?--ain't satisfied with a thousand candles, but has to have a lamp!--I do wonder what the devil that fellow wants that lamp for? Take him another candle, and then if----"

"But he wants the lamp--says he'll burn the d--d old house down if he don't get a lamp!" (a remark which I never made.)

"I'd like to see him at it once. Well, you take it along--but I swear it beats my time, though--and see if you can't find out what in the very nation he wants with that lamp."

And he went off growling to himself and still wondering and wondering over the unaccountable conduct of No. 15. The lamp was a good one, but it revealed some disagreeable things--a bed in the suburbs of a desert of room--a bed that had hills and valleys in it, and you'd have to accommodate your body to the impression left in it by the man that slept there last, before you could lie comfortably; a carpet that had seen better days; a melancholy washstand in a remote corner, and a dejected pitcher on it sorrowing over a broken nose; a looking-glass split across the centre, which chopped your head off at the chin and made you look like some dreadful unfinished monster or other; the paper peeling in shreds from the walls.