"Then step outside a minute, will yer? There's a genaman wants to speak to you right away on a matter as concerns you close."
Ryan coldly looked the man over: "Then tell him to come in here. No! I ain't got no time to fool with him now. Tell him to go to the devil."
The stranger never moved a muscle. "There's a reason w'y he can't come in here—you'll see when you come outside, all right." Then bringing his dark face sharply a foot nearer, he went on in a hasty undertone: "Hey, you! Ever hear of a man named Maginnis?"
Ryan had: Peter's fame had traveled far in Hunston that day.
"Well, listen! There's a game on to bust this meetin' to-night and put the hook into you good and hard. Maginnis has spent a thousand to do it. D'yer savvy? Now will yer step lively?"
The boss considered a moment and then stepped lively. Varney, falling in behind, stepped lively too, his curiosity strongly stirred. But outside, before the theatre, there was no sign of a gentleman awaiting an audience: only the people pouring on into the Academy.
"Around the corner," whispered the dark man hoarsely. "He dassen't wait here. Quick!"
Around the corner the pair hurried, Varney close in their wake. In the silent alley, half-hidden in the shadows of the building, stood a large carriage with a pair of strapping bays tugging at their traces. They halted before it, and the stranger, who had considerately taken Ryan's arm, flung open the door.
"Here he is, Jim—Mr. Ryan. Now you c'n tell him—"
The sentence died unended. At the same moment the sound of a violent scuffle smote the nocturnal air. It appeared that Jim, presumably laboring under an unfortunate misapprehension, had not received his visitor with that refined hospitality due from one gentleman to another. Even more inexplicable, it looked in the deceitful darkness, remarkably as though the boss's guide, suddenly dropping that gentleman's arm, had laid forcible hold upon his outraged and madly protesting legs.