It was three o’clock in the afternoon of the day which followed their
capture, and the two Members of Parliament showed no signs of becoming
reconciled to their situation. Mr. Sanders grumbled and occasionally
swore. Mr. Dick passed from bursts of violent rage to fits of
lamentation over the desolate condition of Mrs. Dick. Dr. O’Grady and
Patsy Devlin bore with them patiently for a long time. But there are
limits to human endurance. After a consultation with Patsy, the doctor
undertook to speak seriously to the unreasonably afflicted men. The
bearded anarchist who usually attended to the wants of the prisoners,
carried off the dinner things. Dr. O’Grady pulled Mr. Dick’s bed out to
the middle of the floor.
“Now,” he said, “sit down on that, the two of you in a row, till I try
if I can’t talk sense into you.”
“Why,” said Mr. Sanders sulkily, “why should we sit there and be talked
to by you?”
“There are two reasons why you should,” said Dr. O’Grady. “The first is
because I want to talk to you, and I can do that much more conveniently
if you’re seated in a row in front of me than if you’re scattered about
all over the room. Does that satisfy you, or must I give you the second
reason?”
“I won’t be talked to by you,” said Mr. Dick. “You’re in league with
the infernal scoundrels who have locked us up here.”
“My good man----” said Mr. Sanders.
This pacific form of address produced no more effect on Dr. O’Grady
than Mr. Dick’s blunt denunciation did. Mr. Sanders was given no time
to finish his remark.
“The second reason why you should is because it will be the worse for
you if you don’t.”
“Do you mean to threaten us with violence?” said Mr. Dick.
“Patsy,” said Dr. O’Grady, “take off your coat, roll up your sleeve
and show your arm. I may mention, gentlemen, that Patsy Devlin was a
blacksmith by trade before he took to being a captive. He’s used to
hammering.”
Mr. Dick and Mr. Sanders watched Patsy Devlin bare his arm, but they
made no move towards the bed.
“Patsy,” said Dr. O’Grady, “roll up your other sleeve. If you want to
fight, gentlemen, I’d recommend you to take off your coats.”
“I can’t fight,” said Mr. Sanders, “on account of my heart. It’s weak,
and the doctor expressly forbade any form of excitement or violent
exercise. If it wasn’t for that----”
He sat down on a corner of the bed.
“I haven’t fought for years,” said Mr. Dick with spirit; “but I’m not
going to be bullied by a damned Irish doctor. Come on.”
The speech was worthy of a man who had once at least felt the blood of
the ancient Bersekers coursing through his veins. It was followed by
prompt action. He took off his coat. Patsy Devlin spat on his hands and
then rubbed them together.
“Mr. Dick,” said Dr. O’Grady, “I don’t want to have you smashed up,
partly because from what you’ve told us about your wife I expect she’d
be sorry, and partly because it’d be a nuisance to me to have to fit
you together again. If you don’t sit down on that bed, I’ll ring the
bell for the Emperor and get him to take away your clothes. You didn’t
like going about in nothing but your shirt yesterday evening. Just
recollect that, and be careful.”
Mr. Dick thought better of his resolution. It may have been the
business-like way in which Patsy spat on his hands which daunted him,
or it may have been Dr. O’Grady’s second and very horrible threat. He
sat down sulkily beside Mr. Sanders.
“Now,” said Dr. O’Grady, “I’m going to speak plainly to you for your
own good. You’ve behaved uncommonly badly since you came here. You’ve
sulked and you’ve whimpered, and you’ve raved in such a way as to make
Patsy Devlin and me quite uncomfortable. We made every excuse for you
yesterday afternoon. We recognized that Mr. Dick couldn’t be expected
to be cheerful when he hadn’t got any trousers. We knew that what had
happened would upset Mr. Sanders’ heart and bring on palpitations. We
did our best to make things easy for you. When the assistant anarchists
brought up your beds, we made them for you, and allowed you to get into
them, although it was barely five o’clock, and the habit of going to
bed at that hour is most unsociable. Patsy brought your tea over to you
later on before he drank a drop himself, to save you the trouble of
getting out of bed. That was pure kindness of heart on Patsy’s part,
and you didn’t so much as say ‘thank you.’”
“They did not,” said Patsy, who stood behind the bed with sleeves
still rolled up; “and it will be long enough before I do the like
again.”
“After tea,” said Dr. O’Grady, “I sent for the Emperor and persuaded
him to let Mr. Dick have his clothes back. I needn’t have done that. It
didn’t matter to me if he had to go about stark naked for the rest of
his natural life. Did you show any gratitude this morning? Not a bit.
You sulked and whimpered again in the most unbearable manner. We put up
with it. We tried to cheer you. There was an egg short at breakfast.
Who did without? Patsy again; although he deserved an egg a great deal
more than either of you. When breakfast was over, I suggested that we
should all join in the game of flipping pennies across the table. I
didn’t do that because I wanted to play. As a matter of fact, I don’t
usually play in the morning; I read. Patsy will bear me out in that. I
was prepared to sacrifice my own time and inclination to amuse you. How
did you receive the proposal? You sulked again.”
“I was brought up strictly,” said Mr. Sanders; “I belong to the Free
Kirk, and my conscience will not allow me to gamble.”
“That,” said Dr. O’Grady, “is a paltry excuse, which you ought to be
ashamed to make. No man could be brought up to think it wrong to flip
pennies. Besides, what is it that’s wrong about gambling? It’s the
excitement created by the element of risk associated with all gambling.
Now, in this case, as you know perfectly well, there would have been
no excitement, because there was no element of risk. The thing was a
dead certainty. Patsy would have given you ten points in every game and
beaten the head off you. If you had to make an excuse, why didn’t you
trot out your weak heart again? That would have been more reasonable.
When you wouldn’t play that, I proposed another game, called Moggy, at
which you wouldn’t have had a chance of winning either. You refused it
too. Then I said that if you liked we’d have a debate on Home Rule or
Tariff Reform. I said that you two could choose your own side and that
Patsy and I would take the other, whatever it was. I thought that would
interest you. It would have bored both Patsy and me frightfully; but we
were prepared to put up with that for your sakes.”
“How could you expect us to take an interest in Tariff Reform,” said
Mr. Dick, “when our minds were full of----”
“Patsy,” said Dr. O’Grady, “if that man mentions his wife again, hit
him with the flat of your hand on the side of the head. Now go on, Mr.
Dick.”
“When--when we were imprisoned,” said Mr. Dick.
“That ought not to have stopped you,” said Dr. O’Grady. “The great
problems of your country’s welfare ought to come before considerations
of your personal convenience. Think of the ancient Romans. Remember
Horatius, and Coriolanus, and the fellow that jumped into the hole in
the Forum. That’s the way you ought to be behaving instead of grumbling
and growling. Now I’m going to give you another chance. If you choose
to behave like reasonable human beings, well and good. Patsy and I will
do everything in our power to make your stay here pleasant for you. If
you won’t, you shan’t have a bite or sup until you do. I’ll give you
three minutes by my watch to make up your minds. Will you or will you
not be sociable and pleasant? Will you join us in a game of Hunt the
Slipper? Come over to the window, Patsy, and leave them to make up
their minds together.”
Patsy and Dr. O’Grady stood looking out at the yard; the doctor held
his watch in his hand; there was dead silence in the room.
“One minute gone,” said Dr. O’Grady.
There was a sound of whispering which ceased abruptly.
“Two minutes gone.”
There was more whispering. Then Mr. Sanders spoke.
“Don’t choose such a silly game,” he said. “We can’t play Hunt the
Slipper. We really can’t. Dick says he’d rather starve.”
“I’m not particular about what game you choose,” said Dr. O’Grady,
“so long as it’s a possible game. There’s no use your saying golf or
cricket or lawn tennis, because we’ve no way of playing them here. You
can have Drop the Handkerchief, if you like, or Oranges and Lemons.”
This time there was a good deal of whispering, a kind of debate
conducted with great earnestness.
“I’ll play Hop Scotch, if you like,” said Mr. Sanders; “but Dick won’t.”
“Never mind about Mr. Dick,” said the doctor. “He’ll join in when he
sees how pleasant it is. You can play Hop Scotch, I suppose, Patsy?”
“I cannot,” said Patsy. “I never heard tell of it.”
“I can’t either,” said the doctor. “But it’ll be all right: Mr. Sanders
will teach us.”
“I shall want a piece of chalk,” said Mr. Sanders.
“There’s no chalk here,” said Dr. O’Grady. “Will nothing else do you?
What’s the chalk for?”
“I have to mark out a figure on the boards,” said Mr. Sanders.
“I’ve a small bottle of Condy’s Fluid in my bag,” said the doctor,
“that I carry about with me for disinfecting my hands. You could manage
with it, I dare say.”
“You can stain the floor with Condy’s Fluid,” said Mr. Dick, who was
really a sociable man, and was beginning to be interested in the
proceedings. “When we were first married and went into our new house,
my wife----”
“Now, don’t start talking about your wife,” said Dr. O’Grady, “just as
you’re beginning to cheer up. You’ll upset yourself again.”
Mr. Sanders went down on his hands and knees. He made a little pool of
Condy’s Fluid on the floor and drew lines from it with his forefinger.
The rest of the party watched with great interest. Suddenly he stopped
and knelt bolt upright.
“What’s that noise?” he said.
“I didn’t hear any noise,” said Dr. O’Grady. “There wasn’t any noise.
Go on Hop Scotching.”
“There was a noise. I heard it. A noise like a fall. I have very sharp
hearing.”
“That always goes with a weak heart,” said Dr. O’Grady. “But----”
He stopped abruptly. This time there was an unmistakable noise, a shout
uttered somewhere in the lower part of the house, which reached even
the remote room where the captives were. They drew together and waited,
breathless. Mr. Sanders grew very white.
“They’re fighting downstairs,” he said.
“Perhaps the police have come,” said Mr. Dick. “Perhaps we shall be
rescued. I knew that my wife would do everything to find me. I knew she
would find me.”
“You didn’t seem to think so yesterday,” said Dr. O’Grady. “And I
wouldn’t make too sure now, if I were you. If they are fighting
downstairs, and I can’t hear plainly enough to be certain----”
“I can,” said Mr. Sanders.
“I expect,” said Dr. O’Grady, “that the Emperor will get the best of
it. He’ll probably be in on us here in a minute or two as proud as
Punch at having bagged another chance traveller. If the Emperor has a
fault at all, it’s his extraordinary fondness for kidnapping people. I
can’t think why he does it.”
“They’re coming upstairs,” said Mr. Sanders. “I hear them distinctly.”
“They are,” said Dr. O’Grady; “a whole lot of people. I wonder who he
has got this time.”
The door of the room was unlocked. There was a short scuffle outside,
and then Sergeant Farrelly and Constable Cole were thrust in. They both
looked as if they had been roughly handled. The sergeant’s tunic was
torn, his right eye was beginning to swell, and there was blood on his
lower lip. Mr. Red, looking very grim and determined, stalked into the
room behind them.
“Emperor,” said Dr. O’Grady, “this is too much. I complained to you
yesterday about the habit you have got into of thrusting strange people
in on top of me and Patsy. I put up with the last two, but this is more
than I am going to stand.”
“They remain here,” said Mr. Red, “as captives.”
“Not at all,” said Dr. O’Grady. “Think it over, Emperor, and
you’ll come to see that you can’t possibly leave them here. You
are an anarchist, an anti-military anarchist. You’ve often told
me so yourself. Now, an anarchist, as I understand his position,
is absolutely pledged to every kind of social reform. Whatever
anybody else may do, an anarchist can’t consistently go in for the
over-crowding of tenement houses, or tolerate insanitary prisons. You
see that, don’t you? If ever it got out that you’d shut up six men in
one room and kept them there, your reputation would be gone. There
wouldn’t be a decent anarchist anywhere in the world who’d recognize
you as belonging to his party or so much as speak to you. You’d be a
sort of Suraja Dowlah with a horrible Black Hole of Calcutta story
cropping up against you at every turn. You simply must give these two
men---- Oh, you’re going, are you? Very well. But think over what I’ve
said. You’ll realize that I’m right.”
Mr. Red shut the door and locked it. Sergeant Farrelly turned fiercely
on Constable Cole.
“You born fool,” he said, “why didn’t you strike him when I had him
down?”
“I’d have----”
“I suppose it was planning a stratagem you were,” said the sergeant,
“instead of striking when you got the chance.”
“I’d have broke his head,” said Constable Cole, “if so be I’d struck
him and me in the rage I was in at the time. How would I know but that
it might be murder?”
“Serve you right if he broke yours,” said the sergeant.
“Come now,” said Dr. O’Grady, “there’s no use making a fuss. You put up
a middling good fight to judge by the look of you, and you ought to be
content. None of the rest of us did as much.”
“Is that yourself, doctor?” said the sergeant.
“It is.”
“And, by the holy,” said Constable Cole, “he has Patsy Devlin along
with him!”
“And us thinking that the two of yez was off to America,” said the
sergeant.
“I heard that you thought I’d gone,” said Dr. O’Grady; “but what made
you suspect poor Patsy?”
“Hadn’t he the funds collected for the sports?” said the sergeant.
“Be damn!” said Patsy, “but that wasn’t the cause of my going off, and
well you know it, sergeant. It’s little call you have to be saying
that about me, and you out after me at the time for the murder of the
doctor. Wasn’t that enough for you to be saying, without the other?”
“My wife?” said Mr. Dick. “Did you see her? Was she well?”
“She’s distressed,” said the sergeant. “The whole of them’s distressed,
and small blame to them. I couldn’t rightly tell this minute which of
the ladies was your wife; but they were all round at the barrack this
morning, and it would have gone to your heart to see the way they were.”
“As we’re on the subject of ladies,” said Dr. O’Grady, “I suppose
Miss Blow is out after me. I heard from Patsy that she’d arrived in
Clonmore.”
“You may say she is,” said the sergeant. “She has the officer’s heart
fair broke, pursuing him here and there, and not letting him rest in
his bed at night the way he’d have us all scouring the country for your
dead body.”
“And was it looking for me that brought you here, sergeant?” said Dr.
O’Grady.
“It was after they left the barrack,” said the sergeant, “that the
ladies went up to the Castle--Jimmy O’Loughlin’s boy showing them the
way--thinking that maybe, being a magistrate, Lord Manton would help
them to find yez. What happened there I couldn’t say; but it wasn’t
long after us eating our dinner when the officer came down and Lord
Manton along with him and Miss Blow and the other ladies. Such language
you never heard. There was one lady, tall she was, and dark, with a
kind of a grey dress on her, and a big umbrella under her arm with a
stone knob on the end of the handle of it----”
“My aunt, I think,” said Mr. Sanders.
“She might be. Anyway, barring the doctor’s young lady, she was the
worst of them for wanting to have Mr. Red hanged for murdering the lot
of yez.”
“I wouldn’t wonder if he was hanged,” said Constable Cole, “the way
he’s conducting himself. It’s scandalous.”
“The orders I got,” went on Sergeant Farrelly, “was to proceed
to Rosivera, and ask Mr. Red whether he’d noticed two Members of
Parliament going by his gate on bicycles the day before.”
“And not to be in too great a hurry over the job,” said Constable Cole,
“because you was only doing it to satisfy the ladies.”
“Whisht!” said the sergeant; “what call have you to be repeating
confidential orders? So we came along----”
“Wait a minute,” said Dr. O’Grady. “How did you get off without taking
Miss Blow with you? I’d have expected her to insist on going too.”
“She did,” said the sergeant; “and it was only by means of a stratagem
we got clear of her. It was Constable Cole invented the stratagem.
He’s great at that.”
“How did he manage?”
“Never mind about the stratagem,” said Mr. Sanders; “go on with your
narrative.”
“I’ll tell you about it after,” said the sergeant to Dr. O’Grady in a
whisper. Then he went on delivering himself of his tale very much as if
he were giving evidence in a court of law.
“We reached Rosivera at half-past three P.M. We then knocked at the
door and asked for Mr. Red. We stepped into the hall of the house,
Constable Cole being about two paces behind me. A tall man with a black
beard, whom I can identify and swear to if necessary, came out of a
door on the left, and without warning struck at my head with a stick. I
aimed a blow at him with my fist, not having time to draw my baton, and
knocked him down. I was then engaged by two other men. One of them was
Mr. Red, to whom I am prepared to swear. I shouted to Constable Cole
to strike the man on the ground with his baton, in order to keep him
quiet. Constable Cole did not obey my order.”
“I did not,” said Constable Cole; “sure I might have killed him.”
“We were then overpowered,” said the sergeant, “the man whom I knocked
down coming to the assistance of his comrades. That’s all, gentlemen.”
“I suppose,” said Mr. Dick, “that your officer will immediately
telegraph for the military?”
“He might,” said the sergeant; “but he won’t do it sooner than
to-morrow, anyway. He won’t be expecting us home till late to-night.”
“I must warn the Emperor,” said Dr. O’Grady. “He had better clear out
at once. I shouldn’t like any harm to happen to the Emperor, and I
know he hates soldiers. His whole life is given up to the destruction
of standing armies. He’d break his heart if the military captured him
in the end.”
“Do you mean to say that you intend----” said Mr. Sanders.
“Of course I do,” said Dr. O’Grady. “The Emperor is a thoroughly decent
sort, and has always treated me well. I’m not going to allow him to be
bullied simply to gratify your passion for revenge. You pretend you
think it wrong to gamble, but you’re not above entertaining a spite
against the poor Emperor and wanting to stick a knife into him. I
can tell you, Mr. Sanders, that sort of spirit is a jolly sight more
unchristian than losing a few pence to Patsy Devlin over an innocent
game.”
“The police,” said Mr. Sanders, confidently, “will see that you do not
assist this criminal to escape from justice.”
He looked at Sergeant Farrelly as he spoke. The sergeant scratched his
head.
“Tell me this now,” he said to Dr. O’Grady; “is this any kind of League
work?”
“It is not,” said the doctor. “I don’t suppose the Emperor ever heard
of the League till I mentioned to him the other day that Patsy was a
member of it.”
“If it’s not the League,” said the sergeant, “and if the doctor will
answer for it that the man’s a respectable man----”
“He is,” said the doctor. “Why, my goodness, sergeant, he owns a
motor-car. You’ve seen it yourself, a remarkably fine motor-car; one
that couldn’t have cost less than eight hundred pounds.”
“I don’t know,” said the sergeant, “that there’s any call for me to
interfere with the doctor in the matter. It would be a queer thing now,
and a thing that wouldn’t suit me at all, if I was to be preventing the
doctor from speaking to a friend of his anyway that pleases him.”
“He attacked you,” said Mr. Sanders; “he knocked you down. He has
imprisoned you, and yet you say----”
“If he’s brought up before the Petty Sessions,” said the sergeant,
“I’ll tell what he’s done; but till he is I don’t see what right I
have to put the handcuffs on the doctor on account of what might be no
more than some kind of a joke that’s passing between him and another
gentleman....”