Charles gasped a violent gasp. 'Colonel Clay!' he shouted, aloud. 'And once more he's done me. There's not a moment to lose. After him, gentlemen! after him!'
Never before in our lives had we had such a close shave of catching and fixing the redoubtable swindler. We burst down the stairs in a body, and rushed out into Fifth Avenue. The pretended poet had only a hundred yards' start of us, and he saw he was discovered. But he was an excellent runner. So was I, weight for age; and I dashed wildly after him. He turned round a corner; it proved to lead nowhere, and lost him time. He darted back again, madly. Delighted with the idea that I was capturing so famous a criminal, I redoubled my efforts—and came up with him, panting. He was wearing a light dust-coat. I seized it in my hands. 'I've got you at last!' I cried; 'Colonel Clay, I've got you!'
He turned and looked at me. 'Ha, old Ten Per Cent!' he called out, struggling. 'It's you, then, is it? Never, never to you, sir!' And as he spoke, he somehow flung his arms straight out behind him, and let the dust-coat slip off, which it easily did, the sleeves being new and smoothly silk-lined. The suddenness of the movement threw me completely off my guard, and off my legs as well. I was clinging to the coat and holding him. As the support gave way I rolled over backward, in the mud of the street, and hurt my back seriously. As
