Colville had left Leo Barebone seated in the hired carriage in a frame of mind far from satisfactory. A seafaring life, more than any other, teaches a man quickness in action. A hundred times a day the sailor needs to execute, with a rapidity impossible to the landsman, that which knowledge tells him to be the imminent necessity of the moment. At sea, life is so far simpler than in towns that there are only two ways: the right and the wrong. In the devious paths of a pavement-ridden man there are a hundred byways: there is the long, long lane of many turnings called Compromise.
Loo Barebone had turned into this lane one night at the Hotel Gemosac, in the Ruelle St. Jacob, and had wandered there ever since. Captain Clubbe had taught him the two ways of seamanship effectively enough. But the education fell short of the necessities of this crisis. Moreover, Barebone had in his veins blood of a race which had fallen to low estate through Compromise and Delay.
Let those throw the first stone at him who have seen the right way gaping before their feet with a hundred pitfalls and barriers, apparently insurmountable, and have resolutely taken that road. For the devious path of Compromise has this merit—that the obstacles are round the corner.
Barebone, absorbed in thought, hardly noticed that the driver of his carriage descended from the box and lounged toward the archway, where the hum of traffic and the passage of many people would serve to beguile a long wait. After a minute’s delay, a driver returned and climbed to the seat—but it was not the same driver. He wore the same coat and hat, but a different face looked out from the sheep-skin collar turned up to the ears. There was no one in the court-yard to notice this trifling change. Barebone was not even looking out of the window. He had never glanced at the cabman’s face, whose vehicle had happened to be lingering at the corner of the Ruelle St. Jacob when Colville and his companion had emerged from the high doorway of the Hotel Gemosac.
Barebone was so far obeying instructions that he was leaning back in the carriage, his face half hidden by the collar of his coat. For it was a cold morning in mid-winter. He hardly looked up when the handle of the door was turned. Colville had shut this door five minutes earlier, promising to return immediately. It was undoubtedly his hand that opened the door. But suddenly Barebone sat up. Both doors were open.
Before he could make another movement, two men stepped quietly into the carriage, each closing the door by which he had entered quickly and noiselessly. One seated himself beside Barebone, the other opposite to him, and each drew down a blind. They seemed to have rehearsed the actions over and over again, so that there was no hitch or noise or bungling. The whole was executed as if by clock-work, and the carriage moved away the instant the doors were closed.
In the twilight, within the carriage, the two men grasped Loo Barebone, each by one arm, and held him firmly against the back of the carriage.
“Quietly, mon bon monsieur; quietly, and you will come to no harm.”
Barebone made no resistance, and only laughed.