"I know him well, sir. He generally puts up at 'Fat Bertha's,' she who has the coffee-house and lodgings for travellers up by Vaalerengen. But he often frequents the sheds in the brick fields and round about there."
I always had a trap in readiness at the police station, and in a quarter of an hour I, and two officers in plain clothes, stopped at a suitable distance from Fat Bertha's lodging-house.
Black John was not there, however, and we began to search among the brick ovens.
Daylight was just breaking when we came to the second oven, and the workmen were arriving with their tin cans in hand. Two men crept out on the other side and began to run across a ploughed field which adjoined one of the sheds.
We set off after them; but it seemed as if they had got too much of a start, and were likely to get away from us in the morning mist.
Suddenly one of them began to drop behind, and we soon had him between us. We let the other one get away for the time being.
The fellow we had got hold of swore and cursed, but otherwise made no resistance.
"If it hadn't been for that sore foot of mine, the police wouldn't have got me this time," he bawled.
We followed the direction of his look, and saw how his left foot had forced its way through the shoe, which was dragging about his ankle.
Black John's volubility did not deceive me. I kept a sharp eye on all his movements. While he, with a kind of raw good nature, joked with the constables, he slowly passed one hand behind him, and with a deft movement threw a small parcel some ten or twelve paces behind him.