The Argosy for May — page 77: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

264 night. Thither I was conducted. As soon as the iron door clanged shut be- , hind me, I threw myself on the narrow board cot, and in a moment was deep in the heavy slumber of physical and men- tal fatigue. It was not yet sunrise when a gen- darme opened my cell door, roused me, and ordered me into the outer office. The same sleepy fellow was at the desk. Beside him lolled Shadrach, a court in- terpreter at his elbow. “'That’s him!” observed Bemis, as I was led forth. ‘ Well, young feller,”’ he continued, addressing me with a cant- ing air of disapproval, “a nice mess you've got us all into, ain’t ye? What your pore old father’ll say, I don’t know. I’ve told them ’ere gentlemen you can’t speak a word of French. So they’ve got an interp’ter to do the talkin’, if any’s. needed.” I was at sea to explain this cryptic speech. All I could gather from it was that I was supposed to know no French. But why, I could not imagine. “This p’lice officer,” went on Bemis, ‘is goin’ to give you one more chance. But I’ve told him if any of his men ketches you on another spree, they’re to lock you up fer a month. Come on home now.” The grinning interpreter kept up a running translation, under his breath, for the official’s amusement. Bemis affixed a sprawling signature to two papers, slipped a louis into the interpreter’s hand, caught me roughly by the coat, and led me out through the vaulted arch- way into the street. There he linked his arm in mine and set off at a tremendous pace. “'What—what does it all mean?” I demanded in amaze. “Tt means your plumb foolishness came near gettin’ you into all sorts of trouble,” he replied, never checking his gait. ‘Lord, son, what a night you've give me! We're goin’ pretty fast now, but it’s the slowest I’ve moved since you an’ me parted last evenin’.” “Where have you been? What—” “Where ain’t I been? Fust to the hotel, where I makes bold to drop in fer advice on your Périer friends. My! What a state they was in! But Miss Elise manages to tell me all about it. my share in De Grieux’s escape. THE ARGOSY. All about your crazy actin’! Son, that business was the wildest, unreasonablest, worst thing I ever heard on. Ar’—an’ I’d like to shake your silly hand!” Which he did with muscular fervor ; then resumed: “T’other feller had decamped by the time I got there. He got away with a whole skin, thanks to you. Then I went to the United States Embassy. Minister Morris was just home from a ball, an’ I ‘guess he was pretty tired, for it was past midnight. But he saw me.’ pee told you not to go there till this morning,” I interrupted. “So you did. So you did. But I’m bad at obeyin’ orders. Besides, I had a kind of sneakin’ notion that this was a case where a little hurry wouldn’t do no great harm to any one. ’Cept, maybe, to the count feller.” “It was on his account I wanted you to wait till this morning, — so he might have time to escape.’ “Yes. Wa’al, mournin’ clo’es is pretty dear. But we needn’t ’a’ wore any on his account. So off I goes to Gouverneur Morris, like I told you.” “And he arranged my release, of course. [ must call to-day and thank him. But why did you make such a queer scene just now at the—”’ “Son, you make more mistakes in fewer words than any man I ever met,” answered Bemis. “For one __ thing, Morris didn’t arrange your release. For another, you’d better not call on him to-day. An—” ‘ Didn’t arrange my release?” said I in astonishment. ‘‘ Then how in—” “It was old Shadrach Bemis what got you off,” he announced, with a lu- dicrous self-complacency. “Look here!” I cried, angered by his conceited air. ‘I was arrested last night as the Comte de Grieux, a pro- scribed aristocrat. That is a case for Fouquier-Tinville, and then the guillo- tine. Even Morris’s influence would be strained, to prove me an American and not an émigré—and to induce the French government to take a lenient view of So why do you claim you set me free?” “T don’t know why I said it, son,” he answered ruefully, ‘‘ unless, maybe, because ’twas so.” CORE MOOOKS (C@