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One by one the others came up from below, and they all jumped over for a swim, except Gregory and the Chief. The latter went poking about, in his silent, methodical way, paying no attention to the orders which Sprague fired at him. "Food! food!" called the banjo-player, climbing aboard; "my wasted frame cries aloud for food. Get out the frying-pan, Chief, and the coffee-pot!
Justin was turning down the light. "Look here, old sport," said the banjo-player, "just let me have that, will you?" He pointed toward the banjo. Justin's jaw dropped, and he raised his hands in horror. "Let yer have that? Holy Cats! Why, Eb would skin me alive an' you too if you was to play on that thing down here!"
The languishing elegance of some, the painstaking laboriousness of others, above all, the feats of a certain enthusiastic banjo-player, who seemed to me to thump his instrument with every part of his body at once, at last so utterly overcame any attempt at decorous gravity on my part that I was obliged to secede; and, considering what the atmosphere was that we inhaled during the exhibition, it is only wonderful to me that we were not made ill by the double effort not to laugh, and, if possible, not to breathe.
Young, ardent, ambitious, as brave as steel, ready with jest or laughter, with his banjo-player following him, going into the hottest battles humming a song, this young Virginian was, in truth, an original character, and impressed powerfully all who approached him. One who knew him well wrote: "Every thing striking, brilliant, and picturesque, seemed to centre in him.
The banjo-player seemed to be perfectly dumb-founded; his friends gathered round, argued, threatened, and finally laughed, and tried to treat the whole thing as a joke. Eb was stubborn, and the man joined our parade, with his banjo under his arm. The police-station and jail were both in a new building half way up the hill. Into this we were hurried, and the doors were shut.
Wishart continued to exercise the rôle of "sandwich-man" or returned to his normal profession of banjo-player. Baubie was to be got hold of in any case. With the muttered adjuration of the wretched girl in Kennedy's Lodgings echoing in her ears, Miss Mackenzie determined that she should be left no longer than could be helped in that company.
Daddles and Jimmy from theirs, on the other side of the corridor. The banjo-player, holding his instrument by the head, was poking the neck of it through his door. Very carefully he managed it, and I soon saw what he was after. The big key, hanging on the wall under the lamp, was just within his reach.
"Now," said the constable, "we'll make short work of you. Names?" He really seemed to be less indignant with us, than with the banjo-player. Burglary was a smaller offence in his eyes than "disturbin' the peace," with a banjo. He soon had the names of Edward Mason, James Rogers Toppan, and Samuel Edwards added to his list. "Name?" he snapped to Mr. Daddles. "Richard Hendricks."
"Contrary to statoot," put in Gregory the Gauger. "Shut up, Mose!" said the constable. "I thought that the peace was pretty well disturbed already," said the banjo-player,"there was so much noise in the street that it woke us all up. I couldn't sleep, none of us could sleep, and I didn't see any harm in playing a tune. Whose peace could I disturb?"
The constable leaned his pitchfork against the wall, lighted one or two lamps, sat down behind a desk and put on a pair of spectacles. Then he jerked his head, as if to beckon, toward the banjo-player. "Name?" said he, picking up a pen. "My name is Warren Sprague," said the man. "Occupation?" "I suppose you would call me a student." "Don't yer know that yer was disturbin' the peace "
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