Page:Harold Macgrath--The girl in his house.djvu/33

 his eye—one of those undeveloped pictures one is never quite certain of—the white of her dress at the window. In Bagdad now, or Delhi, or even Teheran, such an affair would have fitted into the scheme of things quite naturally; but here in New York!

He ran straight for the fence, scrambled over rather than vaulted it. Then that infernal poodle began yammering again. He was later to be made aware of the fact that this same benighted and maligned poodle saved him from a night's lodging in the nearby police station. Armitage did not pause in his inglorious flight until he was on the right of the grille in Seventy-third Street.

He leaned against the bars, panting, but completely and thoroughly reveneered. "Of all the colossal tomfools!" he said, aloud. "What in thunder am I going to do now?"

"Well, Aloysius," boomed a heavy voice, which was followed by a still heavier hand, "you might come along with me; the walking's good. Bell out o' order? Was there any beer in the ice-chest?" The policeman peered under the peak of Armitage's cap. "I saw you climb over that grille. Up with