I
MRS. ROBERTS; THEN MR. ROBERTS
AT the window of her apartment in Hotel Bellingham, Mrs. Roberts stands
looking out into the early nightfall. A heavy snow is driving without,
and from time to time the rush of the wind and the sweep of the flakes
against the panes are heard. At the sound of hurried steps in the
anteroom, Mrs. Roberts turns from the window, and runs to the _portière_,
through which she puts her head.
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Is that you, Edward? So dark here! We ought really to
keep the gas turned up all the time.’
MR. ROBERTS, in a muffled voice, from without: ‘Yes, it’s I.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Well, hurry in to the fire, do! Ugh, what a storm! Do
you suppose anybody will come? You must be half frozen, you poor thing!
Come quick, or you’ll certainly perish!’ She flies from the _portière_
to the fire burning on the hearth, pokes it, flings on a log, jumps back,
brushes from her dress with a light shriek the sparks driven out upon it,
and continues talking incessantly in a voice lifted for her husband to
hear in the anteroom. ‘If I’d dreamed it was any such storm as this, I
should never have let you go out in it in the world. It wasn’t at all
necessary to have the flowers. I could have got on perfectly well, and I
believe _now_ the table would look better without them. The
chrysanthemums would have been quite enough; and I know you’ve taken more
cold. I could tell it by your voice as soon as you spoke; and just as
quick as they’re gone to-night I’m going to have you bathe your feet in
mustard and hot water, and take eight of aconite, and go straight to bed.
And I don’t want you to eat very much at dinner, dear, and you must be
sure not to drink any coffee, or the aconite won’t be of the least use.’
She turns and encounters her husband, who enters through the _portière_,
his face pale, his eyes wild, his white necktie pulled out of knot, and
his shirt front rumpled. ‘Why, Edward, what in the world is the matter?
What has happened?’
ROBERTS, sinking into a chair: ‘Get me a glass of water,
Agnes—wine—whisky—brandy—’
MRS. ROBERTS, bustling wildly about: ‘Yes, yes. But what—Bella!
Bridget! Maggy!—Oh, I’ll go for it myself, and I _won’t_ stop to listen!
Only—only don’t die!’ While Roberts remains with his eyes shut, and his
head sunk on his breast in token of extreme exhaustion, she disappears
and reappears through the door leading to her chamber, and then through
the _portière_ cutting off the dining-room. She finally descends upon
her husband with a flagon of cologne in one hand, a small decanter of
brandy in the other, and a wineglass held in the hollow of her arm
against her breast. She contrives to set the glass down on the mantel
and fill it from the flagon, then she turns with the decanter in her
hand, and while she presses the glass to her husband’s lips, begins to
pour the brandy on his head. ‘Here! this will revive you, and it’ll
refresh you to have this cologne on your head.’
ROBERTS, rejecting a mouthful of the cologne with a furious sputter, and
springing to his feet: ‘Why, you’ve given me the cologne to _drink_,
Agnes! What are you about? Do you want to poison me? Isn’t it enough
to be robbed at six o’clock on the Common, without having your head
soaked in brandy, and your whole system scented up like a barber’s shop,
when you get home?’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Robbed?’ She drops the wineglass, puts the decanter down
on the hearth, and carefully bestowing the flagon of cologne in the
wood-box, abandons herself to justice: ‘Then let them come for me at
once, Edward! If I could have the heart to send you out in such a night
as this for a few wretched rosebuds, I’m quite equal to poisoning you.
Oh, Edward, _who_ robbed you?’
ROBERTS: ‘That’s what I don’t know.’ He continues to wipe his head with
his handkerchief, and to sputter a little from time to time. ‘All I know
is that when I got—phew!—to that dark spot by the Frog Pond, just
by—phew!—that little group of—phew!—evergreens, you know—phew!—’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Yes, yes; go on! I can bear it, Edward.’
ROBERTS: ‘—a man brushed heavily against me, and then hurried on in the
other direction. I had unbuttoned my coat to look at my watch under the
lamp-post, and after he struck against me I clapped my hand to my
waistcoat, and—phew!—’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Waistcoat! Yes!’
ROBERTS: ‘—found my watch gone.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘What! Your watch? The watch Willis gave you? Made out
of the gold that he mined himself when he first went out to California?
Don’t ask me to believe it, Edward! But I’m only too glad that you
escaped with your life. Let them have the watch and welcome. Oh, nay
dear, dear husband!’ She approaches him with extended arms, and then
suddenly arrests herself. ‘But you’ve got it on!’
ROBERTS, with as much returning dignity as can comport with his
dishevelled appearance: ‘Yes; I took it from him.’ At his wife’s
speechless astonishment: ‘I went after him and took it from him.’ He
sits down, and continues with resolute calm, while his wife remains
standing before him motionless: ‘Agnes, I don’t know how I came to do it.
I wouldn’t have believed I could do it. I’ve never thought that I had
much courage—physical courage; but when I felt my watch was gone, a sort
of frenzy came over me. I wasn’t hurt; and for the first time in my life
I realised what an abominable outrage theft was. The thought that at six
o’clock in the evening, in the very heart of a great city like Boston, an
inoffensive citizen could be assaulted and robbed, made me furious. I
didn’t call out. I simply buttoned my coat tight round me and turned and
ran after the fellow.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Edward!’
ROBERTS: ‘Yes, I did. He hadn’t got half-a-dozen rods away—it all took
place in a flash—and I could easily run him down. He was considerably
larger than I—’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Oh!’
ROBERTS: ‘—and he looked young and very athletic; but these things didn’t
seem to make any impression on me.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Oh, I wonder that you live to tell the tale, Edward!’
ROBERTS: ‘Well, I wonder a little at myself. I don’t set up for a great
deal of—’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘But I always knew you had it! Go on. Oh, when I tell
Willis of this! Had the robber any accomplices? Were there many of
them?’
ROBERTS: ‘I only saw one. And I saw that my only chance was to take him
at a disadvantage. I sprang upon him, and pulled him over on his back.
I merely said, “I’ll trouble you for that watch of mine, if you please,”
jerked open his coat, snatched the watch from his pocket—I broke the
chain, I see—and then left him and ran again. He didn’t make the
slightest resistance nor utter a word. Of course it wouldn’t do for him
to make any noise about it, and I dare say he was glad to get off so
easily.’ With affected nonchalance: ‘I’m pretty badly rumpled, I see.
He fell against me, and a scuffle like that doesn’t improve one’s
appearance.’
MRS. ROBERTS, very solemnly: ‘Edward! I don’t know what to say! Of
course it makes my blood run cold to realise what you have been through,
and to think what might have happened; but I think you behaved
splendidly. Why, I never heard of such perfect heroism! You needn’t
tell _me_ that he made no resistance. There was a deadly struggle—your
necktie and everything about you shows it. And you needn’t think there
was only one of them—’
ROBERTS, modestly: ‘I don’t believe there was more.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Nonsense! There are _always_ two! I’ve read the accounts
of those garottings. And to think you not only got out of their clutches
alive, but got your property back—Willis’s watch! Oh, what _will_ Willis
say? But I know how proud of you he’ll be. Oh, I wish I could scream it
from the house-tops. Why didn’t you call the police?’
ROBERTS: ‘I didn’t think—I hadn’t time to think.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘No matter. I’m glad you have _all_ the glory of it. I
don’t believe you half realise what you’ve been through now. And perhaps
this was the robbers’ first attempt, and it will be a lesson to them. Oh
yes! I’m glad you let them escape, Edward. They may have families. If
every one behaved as you’ve done, there would soon be an end of
garotting. But, oh! I can’t bear to think of the danger you’ve run.
And I want you to promise me never, never to undertake such a thing
again!’
ROBERTS: ‘Well, I don’t know—’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Yes, yes; you must! Suppose you had got killed in that
awful struggle with those reckless wretches tugging to get away from you!
Think of the children! Why, you might have burst a blood-vessel! Will
you promise, Edward? Promise this instant, on your bended knees, just as
if you were in a court of justice!’ Mrs. Roberts’s excitement mounts,
and she flings herself at her husband’s feet, and pulls his face down to
hers with the arm she has thrown about his neck. ‘Will you promise?’
II
MRS. CRASHAW; MR. AND MRS. ROBERTS
MRS. CRASHAW, entering unobserved: ‘Promise you what, Agnes? The man
doesn’t smoke _now_. What more can you ask?’ She starts back from the
spectacle of Roberts’s disordered dress. ‘Why, what’s happened to you,
Edward?’
MRS. ROBERTS, springing to her feet: ‘Oh, you may well ask that, Aunt
Mary! Happened? You ought to fall down and worship him! And you _will_
when you know what he’s been through. He’s been robbed!’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Robbed? What nonsense! Who robbed him? _Where_ was he
robbed?’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘He was attacked by two garotters—’
ROBERTS: ‘No, no—’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Don’t speak, Edward! I _know_ there were two. On the
Common. Not half an hour ago. As he was going to get me some rosebuds.
In the midst of this terrible storm.’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Is this true, Edward?’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Don’t answer, Edward! One of the band threw his arm round
Edward’s neck—so.’ She illustrates by garotting Mrs. Crashaw, who
disengages herself with difficulty.
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Mercy, child! What _are_ you doing to my lace?’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘And the other one snatched his watch, and ran as fast as
he could.’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Willis’s watch? Why, he’s got it on.’
MRS. ROBERTS, with proud delight: ‘Exactly what I said when he told me.’
Then, very solemnly: ‘And do you know _why_ he’s got it on?—’Sh, Edward!
I _will_ tell! Because he ran after them and took it back again.’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Why, they might have killed him!’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Of _course_ they might. But _Edward_ didn’t care. The
idea of being robbed at six o’clock on the Common made him so furious
that he scorned to cry out for help, or call the police, or anything; but
he just ran after them—’
ROBERTS: ‘Agnes! Agnes! There was only _one_.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Nonsense, Edward! How could you tell, so excited as you
were?—And caught hold of the largest of the wretches—a perfect young
giant—’
ROBERTS: ‘No, no; not a _giant_, my dear.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Well, he was _young_, anyway!—And flung him on the
ground.’ She advances upon Mrs. Crashaw in her enthusiasm.
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Don’t you fling _me_ on the ground, Agnes! I won’t have
it.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘And tore his coat open, while all the rest were tugging at
him, and snatched his watch, and then—and then just walked coolly away.’
ROBERTS: ‘No, my dear; I ran as fast as I could.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Well, _ran_. It’s quite the same thing, and I’m just as
proud of you as if you had walked. Of course you were not going to throw
your life away.’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘I think he did a very silly thing in going after them at
all.’
ROBERTS: ‘Why, of course, if I’d thought twice about it, I shouldn’t have
done it.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Of course you wouldn’t, dear! And that’s what I want him
to promise, Aunt Mary: never to do it again, no matter _how_ much he’s
provoked. I want him to promise it right here in your presence, Aunt
Mary!’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘I think it’s much more important he should put on another
collar and—shirt, if he’s going to see company.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Yes; go right off at once, Edward. How you _do_ think of
things, Aunt Mary! I really suppose I should have gone on all night and
never noticed his looks. Run, Edward, and do it, dear. But—kiss me
first! Oh, it _don’t_ seem as if you could be alive and well after it
all! Are you sure you’re not hurt?’
ROBERTS, embracing her: ‘No; I’m all right.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘And you’re not injured internally? Sometimes they’re
injured internally—aren’t they, Aunt Mary?—and it doesn’t show till
months afterwards. Are you sure?’
ROBERTS, making a cursory examination of his ribs with his hands: ‘Yes, I
think so.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘And you don’t feel any bad effects from the cologne _now_?
Just think, Aunt Mary, I gave him cologne to drink, and poured the brandy
on his head, when he came in! But I was determined to keep calm,
whatever I did. And if I’ve poisoned him I’m quite willing to die for
it—oh, quite! I would gladly take the blame of it before the whole
world.’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Well, for pity’s sake, let the man go and make himself
decent. There’s your bell now.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Yes, do go, Edward. But—kiss me—’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘He _did_ kiss you, Agnes. Don’t be a simpleton!’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Did he? Well, kiss me again, then, Edward. And now do
go, dear. M-m-m-m.’ The inarticulate endearments represented by these
signs terminate in a wild embrace, protracted halfway across the room, in
the height of which Mr. Willis Campbell enters.
III
MR. CAMPBELL, MRS. CRASHAW, MR. AND MRS. ROBERTS
WILLIS, pausing in contemplation: ‘Hello! What’s the matter? What’s she
trying to get out of you, Roberts? Don’t you do it, anyway, old fellow.’
MRS. ROBERTS, in an ecstasy of satisfaction: ‘Willis! Oh, you’ve come in
time to see him just as he is. Look at him, Willis!’ In the excess of
her emotion she twitches her husband about, and with his arm fast in her
clutch, presents him in the disadvantageous effect of having just been
taken into custody. Under these circumstances Roberts’s attempt at an
expression of diffident heroism fails; he looks sneaking, he looks
guilty, and his eyes fall under the astonished regard of his
brother-in-law.
WILLIS: ‘What’s the matter with him? What’s he been doing?’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘’Sh, Edward! What’s he been doing? What does he look as
if he had been doing?’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Agnes—’
WILLIS: ‘He looks as if he had been signing the pledge. And he—smells
like it.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘For shame, Willis! I should think you’d sink through the
floor. Edward, not a word! I _am_ ashamed of him, if he _is_ my
brother.’
WILLIS: ‘Why, what in the world’s up, Agnes?’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Up? He’s been _robbed_!—robbed on the Common, not five
minutes ago! A whole gang of garotters surrounded him under the Old
Elm—or just where it used to be—and took his watch away! And he ran
after them, and knocked the largest of the gang down, and took it back
again. He wasn’t hurt, but we’re afraid he’s been injured internally; he
may be bleeding internally _now_—Oh, do you think he is, Willis? Don’t
you think we ought to send for a physician?—That, and the cologne I gave
him to drink. It’s the brandy I poured on his head makes him smell so.
And he all so exhausted he couldn’t speak, and I didn’t know what I was
doing, either; but he’s promised—oh yes, he’s promised!—never, never to
do it again.’ She again flings her arms about her husband, and then
turns proudly to her brother.
WILLIS: ‘Do you know what it means, Aunt Mary?’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Not in the least! But I’ve no doubt that Edward can
explain, after he’s changed his linen—’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Oh yes, do go, Edward! Not but what I should be proud and
happy to have you appear just as you are before the whole world, if it
was only to put Willis down with his jokes about your absent-mindedness,
and his boasts about those California desperadoes of his.’
ROBERTS: ‘Come, come, Agnes! I _must_ protest against your—’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Oh, I know it doesn’t become me to praise your courage,
darling! But I should like to know what Willis would have done, with all
his California experience, if a garotter had taken his watch?’
WILLIS: ‘I should have let him keep it, and pay five dollars a quarter
himself for getting it cleaned and spoiled. Anybody but a literary man
would. How many of them were there, Roberts?’
ROBERTS: ‘I only saw one.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘But of course there were more. How could he tell, in the
dark and excitement? And the one he did see was a perfect giant; so you
can imagine what the rest must have been like.’
WILLIS: ‘Did you really knock him down?’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Knock him down? Of course he did.’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Agnes, _will_ you hold your tongue, and let the men
alone?’
MRS. ROBERTS, whimpering: ‘I can’t, Aunt Mary. And you couldn’t, if it
was yours.’
ROBERTS: ‘I pulled him over backwards.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘There, Willis!’
WILLIS: ‘And grabbed your watch from him?’
ROBERTS: ‘I was in quite a frenzy; I really hardly knew what I was
doing—’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘And he didn’t call for the police, or anything—’
WILLIS: ‘Ah, that showed presence of mind! He knew it wouldn’t have been
any use.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘And when he had got his watch away from them, he just let
them go, because they had families dependent on them.’
WILLIS: ‘I should have let them go in the first place, but you behaved
handsomely in the end, Roberts; there’s no denying that. And when you
came in she gave you cologne to drink, and poured brandy on your head.
It must have revived you. I should think it would wake the dead.’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘I was all excitement, Willis—’
WILLIS: ‘No, I should think from the fact that you had set the decanter
here on the hearth, and put your cologne into the wood-box, you were
perfectly calm, Agnes.’ He takes them up and hands them to her. ‘Quite
as calm as usual.’ The door-bell rings.
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Willis, _will_ you let that ridiculous man go away and
make himself presentable before people begin to come?’ The bell rings
violently, peal upon peal.
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Oh, my goodness, what’s that? It’s the garotters—I know
it is; and we shall all be murdered in our beds!’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘What in the world can it—’
WILLIS: ‘Why don’t your girl answer the bell, Agnes? Or I’ll go myself.’
The bell rings violently again.
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘_No_, Willis, you sha’n’t! Don’t leave me, Edward! Aunt
Mary!—Oh, if we _must_ die, let us all die together! Oh, my poor
children! Ugh! What’s that?’ The servant-maid opens the outer door,
and uttering a shriek, rushes in through the drawing-room _portière_.
BELLA THE MAID: ‘Oh, my goodness! Mrs. Roberts, it’s Mr. Bemis!’
MRS. ROBERTS: ‘Which Mr. Bemis?’
ROBERTS: ‘What’s the matter with him?’
MRS. CRASHAW: ‘Why doesn’t she show him in?’
WILLIS: ‘Has _he_ been garotting somebody too?’