“Why are ye asking?” inquired the sergeant, with a frown.
“I thought there might be a reward standing,” explained Murray, easily. “I know the man well. He seems to be keeping himself pretty shady at present. I could lay my hands on him at any time. If there should be a reward———”
“There’s no reward,” interrupted the sergeant, shortly. “The man’s not wanted. And neither are ye. So, get out. Ye are frindly with um, and ye would be selling um. Out with ye quick, or I’ll give ye a start.”
Murray gazed at the officer with serene and virtuous dignity.
“I would be simply doing my duty as a citizen and gentleman,” he said, severely, “if I should assist the law in laying hold of one of its offenders.”
Murray hurried back to the bench in the park. He folded his arms and shrank within his clothes to his ghost-like presentment.
Ten minutes afterward the Captain arrived at the rendezvous, windy and thunderous as a dog-day in Kansas. His collar had been torn away; his straw hat had been twisted and battered; his shirt with oxblood stripes split to the waist. And from head to knee he was drenched with some vile and ignoble greasy fluid that loudly proclaimed to the nose its component leaven of garlic and kitchen stuff.
[183]
