Page:Mary Rinehart - More Tish .djvu/208

 200  -fish-trunk-pencil stuff. And you can't book-soup-oysters yourself out of jail."

"I'm taking my own, and only my own," Tish said with dignity.

Well, I dressed and we went out into the street. I tried to tell Tish that even if we got it we couldn't take it home and hide it under the bed or in a bureau drawer, but she was engrossed in her own thoughts, and besides, the streets were entirely dark and not a taxicab anywhere. She had a city map, however, and a flashlight, and at last about two in the morning we reached the street where she said it was stored in a garage.

I was limping by that time, and there were cold chills running up and down my spine, but Tish was quite calm. And just then there was a terrific outburst of noise, whistles and sirens of all sorts, and a man walking near us suddenly began to run and dived into a doorway.

"Air raid," said Tish calmly, and walked on. I clutched at her arm, but she shook me off.

"Tish!" I begged.

"Don't be a craven, Lizzie," she said. "Statistics show that the percentage of mortality from these things is considerably less than from mumps, and not to be compared with riding in an elevator or with the perils of maternity."

All sorts of people were running madly by