And now the whole house was in confusion.
Mrs. Curtis lay screaming and shrieking in bed—the captain rushed upon the landing, with nothing on save his shirt, and looking as if he had just sprung out of a water-butt—Curtis followed, sulky and not half satisfied with the apology he had received relative to the presence of the officer in his wife's chamber—the two men who had been left down stairs were running up as hard as they could—and the servants were calling from the garrets to know what was the matter, but rather suspecting something very much like the real truth in respect to the invasion of the bailiffs.
"Down—down with ye, wild bastes that ye are!" vociferated the captain, as the light which Curtis still carried showed the gallant officer the well known faces of Mac Grab and Proggs.
But the two men, who had worked their courage up to the sticking point, produced each a heavy horse-pistol; at the appearance of which formidable weapons the captain hung back, and Curtis shouted out in alarm, "No violence! I'll keep my word and go off with you quiet enough."
"Be Jasus! and you shan't though, my dear frind!" cried O'Blunderbuss, looking rapidly round in search of some object which he might use as an offensive weapon against the invaders; but the two men from down stairs now made their appearance, and Curtis put an end to all further hostilities by surrendering himself to them without any more ado.
"Frank! Frank!" shrieked his wife from the bed-room.
"Curthis, my frind—don't be a fool!" roared the captain: "we'll bate 'em yet!"
The young gentleman, however, took no notice either of his wife's appeal or his friend's adjuration, and rapidly descended the stairs, followed by the sheriff's-officers. He was not only afraid of the pistols; but he was likewise too much annoyed at the bed-chamber scene to care about remaining in the house any longer. Not having courage enough to resent the wrong which he conceived to have been done him, he was nevertheless unable to endure it passively; and here signed himself, moodily and sulkily, to the lot which circumstances had shaped for him.
Mac Grab and one of the subordinates accordingly departed with their prisoner to the spunging-house in Chancery Lane; while Proggs and the other man remained in possession of the dwelling in Baker Street.
It was about half-past four o'clock on that dark and chilly morning, when Frank Curtis entered the lock-up establishment owned by Mr. Mac Grab, the sheriff's-officer. A racking head-ache, the result of the preceding night's debauch—a cold nervousness, amounting almost to a continuous shiver,—and thoughts of by no means a pleasant nature, all combined to depress the young man's spirits to a very painful degree; and, as the door of the spunging-house closed behind him, he murmured to himself, "Oh! what a fool I have been!" Fortunately, he had plenty of ready money in his pocket; and, putting a guinea into Mac Grab's hand, he said, "Let me have a private room; and have a fire lighted directly."