Clare made no answer, but walked obedient. It was a sad
procession--comical indeed, but too sad when realized to continue
ludicrous. The thin, long-bodied, big-headed, long-haired,
long-tailed, short-legged animal that followed last, seemed to close
it with a never-ending end.

There was no moon; nothing but the gas-lamps lighted Clare's _Via
dolorosa_. He hugged the baby and kept on, laying his cheek to hers to
comfort her, and receiving the comfort he did not seek.

They came at last to the _lock-up_, a new building in the rear of the
town-house. There this tangle of humanity, torn from its rock and
afloat on the social sea, drifted trailing into a bare brilliant room,
and at its head, cast down but not destroyed, went heavy-laden Clare,
with so much in him, but only his misery patent to eyes too much used
to misery to reap sorrow from the sight.

The head policeman--they called him the inspector--received the
charge, that of house-breaking, and entered it. Then they were taken
away to the lock-up--all but the faithful Abdiel, who, following,
received another of the kicks which that day rained on every member of
that epitome of the human family except the baby, who, small enough
for a mother to drown, was too small for a policeman to kick. The door
was shut upon them, and they had to rest in that grave till the
resurrection of the morning should bring them before the magistrate.

Their quarters were worse than chilly--to all but the baby in her
blanket manifoldly wrapped about her, and in Clare's arms. Tommy would
gladly have shared that blanket, more gladly yet would have taken it