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Arved put out his hand, searching for his comrade. "Quell, Quell!" he whispered. Quell rose darkly beside him, a narrow lath of humanity. Locking arms, both walked briskly until, turning a sharp, short corner, they beheld, all smiling in the night, a summer garden, well lighted and full of gay people, chattering, singing, eating, drinking happy!
No wonder anarchy is thriving, no wonder every true artist is an anarch, unavowed perhaps, yet an anarch, and an atheist." "Not so fast!" interrupted Arved. "I'm an anarchist, but I don't believe in blowing up innocent policemen. Neither do you, Quell. You wouldn't hurt a bartender! Give an anarchist plenty to drink, and he sheds his anarchy like a shirt.
You are never satisfied; which, I take it, is a neat definition of pessimism." "I don't propose to chop logic so early in the morning," was the surly reply. "I'm cold and nervous. Say, did you lift anything before we got away?" Arved smiled the significant smile of a drinking man. "Yes, I did. I waited until Doc McKracken left his office, and then I sneaked this."
Arved and Quell stood in a secret glade and looked at each other solemnly but only for a moment. Laughter, unrestrained laughter, frightened the squirrels and warned them that they were still in danger. "Well, we've escaped this time," said the poet. "Yes; but how long?" was the sardonic rejoinder of the painter. "See here, Quell, you're a pessimist.
Then they stumbled along, bumping into trees, feeling with outstretched arms, but finding nothing to guide them save the few thin stars in the torn foliage overhead. Without watches, they could catch no idea of the hour. The night was far spent, declared Arved; he discovered that he was very hungry. Suddenly, from the top of a steep, slippery bank they pitched forward into the highroad.
"Now, I know you ought to be in the Brain-College, Arved, where your friends could take the little green car that goes by the grounds and see you on Sunday afternoons if weather permits." His accent seemed deliberately insulting to Arved, who, however, let it pass because of their mutual plight. If they fell to fighting, detection would ensue. So he answered in placatory phrases:
So is the fellow crazy who invented wireless telegraphy; so is the man off his base who invents a folding bird cage. We are all crazy, and the craziest gang are our doctors at the Hermitage." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. Arved rolled his handsome head acquiescingly. "You poets and musicians are trying to compass the inane.
Arved touched his temple significantly and nudged Quell. "Another one of us. Another rebel of the moon!" "Shut up or I'll gag you both!" imperiously commanded the doctor, as the wheels of the ambulance cut the pebbly road. They were entering the asylum; now they passed the porter's lodge.
They yawned and damned the darkness, which smelt like stale india-rubber, so Quell said. They cursed life and the bitter taste in their mouths. Quell spoke of his thirst in words that startled the easy-going Arved, who confessed that if he could rid himself of the wool in his throat, he would be comparatively happy.
The severe lines in Quell's face began to swim together. He reached out his hand, took the flask, and then threw back his head. Arved watched him with patient resignation. "Hold on there! Leave a dozen drops for a poor maker of rhymes," he chuckled, and soon was himself gurgling the liquor. They arose, and after despairing glances at their bespattered garments, trudged on.
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