Page:Wilson - The Boss of Little Arcady (1905).djvu/49

 serfs. By four o'clock the only hospitable doorways on the street were those of the three saloons. Our leading business men were departing from their establishments by back doors and the secrecy of gracious alleys.

From Skeyhan's to Hoffmuller's, from Hoffmuller's to the City Hotel, the crowd sang and shouted its irregular progress, the air being "Auld Lang Syne."

It was about this time that the Colonel unhappily caught a glimpse of myself through the window of the hotel. A glad light came into his eyes, and at once he searched among the letters, crying, meanwhile: "My brother in arms! A younger brother, but a gallant officer, none the less—"

I knew that he sought my letter. Egress from the City Hotel may be achieved, when desirable, by a side door, and I saw no more of Potts that day. I believe my letter spoke of him as an able and graceful pleader, meriting judicial honors, or something of that sort. I had forgotten its exact words, but I did not wish to hear Potts read them. So I fled to spend the remainder of that eventful day quietly among rose bushes and tender, budding hyacinths, unspotted of the world, receiving, however, occasional bulletins of the orgy from passers-by. From these arid sundry narratives gleaned the following day, I was able to trace the later hours of this scandalous saturnalia.

By six o'clock Potts had spent all his money. By six-fifteen this fact could no longer be concealed, and such of his following as had not already fallen by the