an awful shrill shriek--and at that noise all these heads vanished from
behind the bars.

"Look at this," marvelled the constable. "It's a wonder to me they
didn't make off with your things while you were waiting."

"I would have taken good care of that," I said defiantly. But the
constable wasn't impressed.

"Much you would have done. The bag going off round one dark corner; the
chest round another. Would you have run two ways at once? And anyhow
you'd have been tripped up and jumped upon before you had run three
yards. I tell you you've had a most extraordinary chance that there
wasn't one of them regular boys about to-night, in the High Street, to
twig your loaded cab go by. Ted here is honest . . . You are on the
honest lay, Ted, ain't you?"

"Always was, orficer," said the big ruffian with feeling. The other
frail creature seemed dumb and only hopped about with the edge of its
soldier coat touching the ground.

"Oh yes, I dare say," said the constable. "Now then, forward, march . . .
He's that because he ain't game for the other thing," he confided to
me. "He hasn't got the nerve for it. However, I ain't going to lose
sight of them two till they go out through the gate. That little chap's
a devil. He's got the nerve for anything, only he hasn't got the muscle.
Well! Well! You've had a chance to get in with a whole skin and with
all your things."

"I was incredulous a little. It seemed impossible that after getting