A cry of surprise and joy burst from his lips as he saw his friends.
“You can take him away with you,” the sergeant said, “and I don’t fancy it will be necessary for any of the party to stay in his place; but remember this: If either of you are brought here within the next six months on a charge of fighting, I shall do all I can to have it go hard with the offender. I want you to promise to keep away from the Vesey Street Market, unless it should be necessary to visit that place on business.”
It can readily be understood how gladly Josiah’s friends promised to do as the officer wished, and in the shortest possible time afterward they took their departure, each mentally congratulating himself that he was not to spend the night in a cell in the station-house.
“Now, that’s what I call doin’ the thing in great shape,” Bill Foss said when they were on the sidewalk once more. “It looked one time as if Josiah was goin’ to see more of New York than he wanted.”
“I guess it would jest about have killed father if he’d found me in jail when he came,” the boy from the country said half to himself; “an’ I’m glad he’ll be here to-morrow mornin’, cause I’ve got all the city I need.”
“Now, don’t let a little thing like that trouble you,” Bob said soothingly. “It doesn’t ’mount to anything.”
“But I reckon it would if it hadn’t been for you,” Bill Foss replied emphatically.
“I didn’t cut much of a figger in it, an’ if I did, it wasn’t any more’n Josiah would ’a done for me; so what’s the use of makin’ all this talk?”
Then Bob changed the conversation by asking if any of the party had noticed in which direction Sim and his friends fled; and in a few moments all, with the exception of Josiah, were deeply engaged discussing the probability of their being able, at some future time, to mete out the proper amount of punishment to those who attempted to destroy the pleasure of the afternoon.
Josiah took no part in the conversation because of his mental troubles. Although he had escaped from a prison cell so readily, he was fully alive to the fact of what his fate might have been but for his friends; and it seemed now as if he was in danger of being re-arrested every moment he remained in the city, until the arrival of his father.